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By  Guglielmo  Ferrero 


The  Greatness  and  Decline  of  Rome 

In  Five  Volumes 

Characters  and  Events  in  Roman  History 

From   Caesar  to   Nero   (60  B.C. -70  A.D.) 

Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

A  Comparative  Study  of  Morals  and  Manners 

Between  the  Old  World  and  the  New 

A   Moral  and  Philosophical  Contrast 


ANCIENT   ROME  AND 
MODERN  AMERICA 

A    COMPARATIVE    STUDY    OF    MORALS 
AND  MANNERS 


BY 
GUGLIELMO    FERRERO 

AUTHOR   OF  "THE   GREATNESS  AND    DECLINE   OF   ROME,"    ETC. 


G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 

NEW    YORK    AND    LONDON 

Tlbe  1kntcF?erbocl?cr  press 


Copyright,  1914 

BY 

GUGLIELMO    FERRERO 

Third  Impression 


Ttbe  ftniclicrbochcr  prcsa,  'Hew  Korb 


PUBLISHER'S  NOTE 

'T^HE  reader  will  find  in  the  following  pages  reference 
"■■  to  another  work  by  Dr.  Ferrero  which  will  shortly 
come  into  publication  under  the  title  of  Betiveen  the 
Old  World  and  the  New.  It  is  in  order  to  explain  that 
Betu'ee?!  the  Old  World  mid  the  Neic  was  brought  into 
print  in  continental  editions  (in  Italy,  in  France  and 
elsewhere)  before  the  publication  of  the  present  work. 
The  author  has,  however,  decided,  that  for  the  English- 
speaking  readers  of  the  two  volumes  it  would  be  ad- 
visable to  change  the  order  of  publication  and  to  issue 
first  this  study  of  Morals  and  Manners.  The  second 
book,  Betrjeen  the  Old  World  and  the  New,  will  appear, 
in  New  York  and  in  London,  early  in  the  autumn  of 
1914. 

New  York, 

April,  IQ14. 


What  is  Progress  ? 


CONTENTS 

PART  ONE 
PART  TWO 


ANCIENT  HISTORY  AND  THE  M0I3ERN  WORLD 

CHAPTER 

I.     Ancien't  Social  Systems  and  Contemporary 

America  .  .  .  .  .  .21 

11.     Quantity  and  Quality        ....       40 

III.  Woman  and  Home       .....       60 

IV.  The   Lesson   of   the   Fall  of   the   Roman 

Empire  .......       77 

V.     Ups  and  Downs  .....       97 

PART  THREE 

EUROPE  AND  AMERICA 

I.  The  American  Definition  of  Progress      .  115 

II.  Facts  and  Motives  in  the  Modern  World  139 

III.  More  or  Better  ?      .         .         .         .         .  161 

IV.  The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  .         .         .  182 
V.  Beyond  Every  Limit           ....  201 

VI.     The  Riddle  of  America     ....     223 

V 


vi  Contents 

PAGE 

PART  FOUR 
POLITICS  AND  JUSTICE  IN  ANCIENT  ROME 

CHAPTER 

I.    The  Trial  of  Verres         .         .         .         .251 
II.     The  Trial  of  Clodius        .         .         .         .275 

III.    The  Trial  of  Piso 299 

PART  FIVE 
The  Limit  of  Sport »     33i 


ANCIENT    ROxME    AND    MODERN 
AMERICA 


Part  I 
What  Is  Progress? 


WHAT  IS  PROGRESS  ? 

'T^HE  object  of  the  essays  collected  in  this  volume, 
-*■  with  the  exception  of  three  which  recount  three 
curious  episodes  in  Roman  history,  is  the  investigation 
of  the  most  important  differences  between  the  ancient 
world  and  the  modem,  between  Europe  and  America; 
in  what  way  and  in  what  particulars  the  civilisations  of 
the  ancients  and  of  Europe  have  been  modified  respec- 
tively by  the  course  of  centuries  and  by  the  passage  of 
the  Atlantic.  The  essays  were  printed  in  the  first 
instance  in  a  monthly  publication — Hearst's  Magazine 
— for  the  perusal  of  the  multitude  of  hasty  readers  who 
are  content  to  skip  from  argument  to  argument,  and 
they  are  now  republished  in  book  form  for  the  benefit 
of  those  readers  who  may  care  to  dwell  on  each  argu- 
ment with  greater  deliberation.  This  volume  may 
be  considered  as  the  bridge  which  connects  the  Great- 
ness and  Decline  of  Rome  with  a  third  work  which,  under 
the  title  of  Between  the  Old  World  and  the  New,  will  be 
published  shortly  in  New  York  and  London. 

A  comparison  between  the  ancient  world  and  the 
modem,  between  Europe  and  America,  suggested  to  a 
writer  of  ancient  history  by  two  long  tours  in  the  New 

3 


4      Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

World — such  is  the  subject  of  this  volume;  and  such  is 
the  subject  of  the  further  book  which  at  an  early  date 
will  again  take  up  a  number  of  the  matters  outlined  in 
these  papers  and  will  submit  these  to  more  exhaustive 
consideration.  But  neither  in  this  volume  nor  in  its 
successor  must  the  reader  expect  the  comparison  to 
resolve  itself  into  a  definite  judgment ;  and  if  he  imagines 
that  he  has  discovered  such  a  verdict,  he  may  rest 
assured  that  he  is  mistaken.  This  book,  and  the  other 
which  will  follow  it,  have  been  written  with  the  express 
purpose  of  emphasising  how  vain  it  is  to  spend  our  time, 
as  we  do,  passing  judgment  "on  the  progress  or  decadence 
of  the  times,  of  nations,  and  of  civilisations;  of  showing 
how  easy  it  is  to  reverse  all  the  reasonings  by  which, 
impelled  by  passions,  interests,  prejudices,  or  illusions, 
we  strive  now  to  exalt,  now  to  abase  ourselves  by  com- 
parison with  the  ancients  and  by  contrasting  the  in- 
habitants of  one  continent  with  those  of  another; 
of  indicating  what  an  easy  and  sure  target  irony  and 
dialectic  have  in  all  the  doctrines,  opinions,  and  beliefs 
with  which  man  endeavours  to  establish  his  by-no- 
means  sure  judgments — all  the  doctrines,  including 
that  of  progress,  at  least  in  the  sense  in  which  progress 
is  generally  understood. 

Including  that  of  progress?  the  American  reader  will 
exclaim,  with  some  misgiving.  But  are  we  not  living 
in  the  age  of  progress?  Can  that  idea  of  progress 
which  every  morning  rises  with  the  sun  and  sheds  new 
splendour  on  the  two  worlds  on  either  side  of  the  Atlan- 


What  Is  Progress?  5 

tic,  and  with  the  sun  arouses  them  to  their  accustomed 
tasks — can  it  be  that  this  idea  is  but  an  illusion?  No. 
The  author  of  these  two  books  has  not  so  much  confi- 
dence in  his  own  wisdom  as  to  try  to  discover  whether 
man  is  really  progressing  or  not;  whether  he  is  moving 
down  the  valley  of  the  centuries  tow^ards  a  fixed  goal, 
or  towards  an  illusion  which  retreats  with  each  step  he 
takes  in  its  direction.  There  is  one  point  only  which 
the  author  proposes  to  make  clear.  There  are  at  the 
present  day,  on  the  one  hand,  those  who  despise  the 
present  and  worship  the  past,  extol  Europe  and  depre- 
ciate America;  on  the  other  hand,  those  who  declare 
that  they  would  not  give  one  hour  of  the  marvellous 
present  in  which  they  live  for  all  the  centuries  of  the 
past,  and  who  rate  America  far  more  highly  than  they 
do  Europe.  The  author  sets  out  to  show  that  the 
reason  why  the  eternal  disputes  between  the  partisans 
of  these  divergent  views  are  so  inconclusive,  is  that  in 
this  discussion,  as  in  so  many  others,  each  side  postu- 
lates two  different  definitions  of  progress,  and  in  their 
discussions  of  the  past  and  of  the  present,  of  Europe 
and  of  America,  they  start  from  this  dual  definition 
as  if  it  were  single  and  agreed.  The  result  is  that 
they  cannot  understand  and  never  will  understand,  if 
they  discuss  for  a  thousand  years,  each  other's  point 
of  view. 

The  worshippers  of  the  present  and  the  admirers  of 
America  argue,  more  or  less  consciously,  from  a  defini- 
tion of  progress  which  would  identify  it  with  the  increase 


6      Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  the  power  and  speed  of  machines,  of  riches,  and  of 
our  control  over  nature,  however  much  that  control 
may  involve  the  frenzied  squandering  of  the  resources 
of  the  earth,  which,  while  immense,  are  not  inexhaustible. 
And  their  arguments  are  sound  in  their  application 
to  the  present  age,  and  also  to  America,  if  we  grant 
that  their  definition  of  progress  is  the  true  one.  For 
though  steam-  and  electricity-driven  machinery  claims 
Europe  as  its  birthplace,  it  has  reached  maturity  and 
has  accomplished  and  is  accomplishing  its  most  extra- 
ordinary feats  in  America,  where,  so  to  speak,  it  found 
virgin  soil  to  exploit.  But  the  opposite  school  in- 
dignantly denies  that  men  are  wasting  their  time  and 
contributing  nothing  to  the  improvement  and  progress 
of  the  world,  when  they  strive  to  embellish  it  or  to 
instruct  it,  to  soothe  and  to  restrain  its  unbridled 
passions.  In  their  view,  the  masterpieces  of  art,  the 
great  religions,  the  discoveries  of  science,  the  specula- 
tions of  philosophy,  the  reform  of  laws,  customs,  and 
constitutions,  are  milestones  along  the  road  to  progress. 
According  to  these,  our  age,  intent  only  on  making 
money,  ought  to  be  ashamed  when  it  compares  itself 
with  the  past.  Machines  are  the  barbarians  of  modern 
times,  which  have  destroyed  the  fairest  works  of  an- 
cient civilisations.  History  will  show  the  discovery  of 
America  to  have  been  little  less  than  a  calamity. 

So  two  persons  who,  starting  from  these  two  defini- 
tions of  progress,  set  to  work  to  judge  the  past  and  the 
present,   Europe  and  America,   will  never  succeed  in 


What  Is  Progress?  7 

understanding  each  other,  any  more  than  two  persons 
who,  wishing  to  measure  a  thing  together,  adopt  two 
different  measures.  And  the  discussion  will  be  the 
more  vain  and  confused,  the  less  clearly  and  precisely 
the  thought  of  each  disputant  apprehends  the  primary 
definition  of  progress,  which  does  duty  as  a  measure 
for  each.  Indeed,  this  unfortunate  state  of  affairs  is 
commoner  than  is  generally  supposed  at  the  present 
day,  with  the  need  for  hurry  which  pursues  us  in  every 
act  and  at  every  moment,  and  with  the  great  whirl  of 
ideas  and  words  which  eddies  around  us.  To  decide, 
then,  whether  our  times  are  or  are  not  greater  than  those 
of  the  ancients,  whether  America  is  superior  to  Europe 
or  Europe  to  America,  we  must  discover  which  of  these 
two  definitions  is  the  true  one.  But  is  it  possible  to 
prove  that  one  of  these  definitions  of  progress  is  true 
and  the  other  false?  How  many  to-day  would  dare 
to  deny  that  man  made  the  world  progress  when,  by 
the  use  of  fire,  he  launched  on  the  path  of  victor^"  the 
locomotive  across  the  earth  and  the  steamer  across  the 
ocean?  Or  when  he  captured  and  led  through  threads 
of  copper  the  invisible  force  of  electricity  adrift  in  the 
universe?  Or  when  he  embellished  the  world  with 
arts,  and  enlightened  it  with  studies,  and  tempered  the 
innate  ferocity  of  human  nature  with  laws,  religion,  and 
customs?  It  is  clear  that  neither  of  these  two  defini- 
tions will  succeed  in  putting  the  other  out  of  court, 
until  men  are  willing  either  to  superhumanise  them- 
selves completely,  renouncing  material  goods  in  favour 


8      Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  spiritual  joys,  or,  sacrificing  the  latter  to  the  former, 
to  bestialise  themselves.  So  long  as  men  with  few 
exceptions  continue  to  desire  riches  and  the  control 
of  nature,  as  well  as  beauty,  wisdom,  and  justice, 
both  these  definitions  of  progress  will  be  partially  true. 
Each  will  present  to  us  one  aspect  of  progress.  It  will 
be  impossible,  if  we  adopt  only  one  of  the  two,  to  de- 
cide whether  we  are  progressive  or  decadent,  whether 
America  is  worth  more  or  less  than  Europe.  Every 
epoch  and  people  will  seem  at  one  time  and  another  to 
be  progressive  or  decadent,  to  be  superior  or  inferior, 
according  as  the  one  or  the  other  definition  is  the  basis 
of  judgment. 

"But,"  the  reader  will  say,  "why  not  then  combine 
the  two  definitions  in  one?  Why  not  say  that  progress 
is  the  increase  of  all  the  good  things  which  man  desires : 
of  riches,  of  wisdom,  of  power,  of  beauty,  of  justice.?  " 
But  in  order  to  make  of  these  two  definitions  a  single 
complete  and  coherent  definition,  we  should  have  to 
be  certain  that  it  is  possible  by  a  single  effort  to  in- 
crease all  the  good  things  of  life.  Is  it  possible,  and 
to  what  extent  is  it  possible?  That  is  a  second  grave 
question  which  this  book  and  its  successor  endeavour 
to  answer. 

Many  and  various  matters  relating  to  Europe  and 
America  are  discussed  in  this  book.  Still  more  various 
and  diverse  arc  the  discussions  in  Between  the  Old  World 
and  the  New,  which  presents  a  series  of  dialogues  occu- 
pying the  leisure  hours  of  a  two  weeks'  voyage,  in  the 


What  Is  Progress? 


& 


course  of  which  persons  of  different  degrees  of  culture 
and  diverse  casts  of  thought  discuss  Hamlet  and  pro- 
gress, machinery  and  Homer,  the  Copernican  system 
and  riches,  science  and  Vedanta  philosophy,  Kant  and 
love,  Europe  and  America,  Christian  Science  and  sexual 
morality.  These  matters  are  discussed  fitfully  with 
mad  rushes  zigzag  over  the  universe;  and  the  fits  and 
rushes  have  somewhat  dismayed  certain  critics  on  this 
side  of  the  Atlantic.  "What  a  jumble!"  they  cny\ 
"What  an  encyclopaedia,  what  an  enormity  it  is! 
What  can  Homer  and  machinery,  Hamlet  and  America, 
Copernicus  and  emigration  have  in  common?" 

In  short,  the  perusal  of  Between  the  Old  World  a7id  the 
New  in  the  original  Italian  has  produced  upon  more 
than  one  critic  the  same  effect  as  if  he  had  come  back 
to  his  house  to  find  all  his  belongings,  his  letters,  his 
furniture,  his  clothes,  shifted  and  turned  upside  down. 
"What  demon  has  been  at  work  here?"  he  cries  in 
dismay.  Such  critics  are  not  altogether  wrong  from 
their  point  of  view.  Nevertheless,  this  demon,  which 
is  always  urging  man  to  turn  his  home  u])sidc  down 
in  the  hopes  of  arranging  it  better,  no  adjuration  will 
succeed  in  exorcising  from  our  epoch.  I  hope  that, 
when  presented  in  the  form  of  a  book,  these  dialogues 
will  produce  a  less  alarming  impression  on  America. 
Accustomed  as  she  is  to  seeing  such  demons  raging  in 
her  house,  she  should  not  permit  herself  to  be  prevented 
from  taking  breath  in  llie  satisfaction  of  having  done 
well,  by  the  ambition  to  do  better.     To  be  sure,  between 


lo     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  so-called  Homeric  question  and  steam-engines, 
between  the  discovery  of  America  and  the  tendencies 
of  philosophy,  between  the  troubles  which  torment  us 
in  private  life  and  the  French  Revolution,  between 
transatlantic  emigration  and  the  architecture  of  New 
York,  there  is  a  connection.  It  is  a  profound,  an  organic, 
a  vital  connection ;  for,  in  the  last  four  centuries,  little 
by  little,  almost  imperceptibly  at  first,  then  with  a 
speed  which  increased  gradually  up  to  the  French  Revo- 
lution, finally,  at  headlong  speed  from  the  Revolution 
to  the  present  day,  the  world  has  changed  in  every  part, 
in  form,  spirit,  and  order.  And  it  has  changed  in  form, 
order,  and  spirit,  because  it  has  changed  the  order  of  its 
demands  upon  man.  In  compensation  for  the  liberty 
granted  him  in  everything  else,  it  has  demanded  of  him 
a  rapidity,  a  punctuality,  an  intensity,  and  a  passivity 
of  obedience  in  his  work,  such  as  no  other  epoch  has 
ever  dreamed  of  being  able  to  exact  from  lazy  human 
nature. 

From  the  French  Revolution  onwards,  throughout 
Europe  and  throughout  America,  the  political  parties, 
the  social  classes,  and  institutions,  and  the  philosophical 
doctrines  which  supported  the  principle  of  authority, 
little  by  little,  but  everywhere  and  unintermittently, 
have  given  way  before  the  onslaught  of  the  parties,  the 
classes,  and  the  doctrines  which  support  the  principle 
of  liberty.  The  former  have  been  forced  sooner  or 
later  to  allow  the  right  of  free  criticism  and  discussion 
to  oust  the  ancient  duty  of  tacit  obedience  in  the  state. 


What  Is  Proirrcss?  ii 


& 


in  religion,  in  the  school,  and  ultimately  in  the  family. 
Poets  and  philosophers  have  extolled  the  liberation  of 
man  from  ancient  servitudes  as  the  most  glorious  vic- 
tory man  can  vaunt.  A  victory,  certainly;  but  over 
whom?  Over  himself,  as  it  seems;  since  the  limits, 
within  which  man  was  content  to  rest  confined  until 
the  French  Revolution,  he  himself  had  erected  and 
invested  with  sacred  terrors.  It  is  clear  that  the  slave, 
the  tyrant,  and  the  liberator  were  one  and  the  same 
person.  Moreover,  one  may  well  think  that,  in  gaining 
his  liberty,  man  has  not  been  born  again  to  a  new  destiny 
nor  has  he  regenerated  his  own  nature;  rather  has  he 
learned  to  employ  his  own  energies  in  a  different  way. 
Man  had  lived  for  centuries  within  strict  limits,  which 
confined  in  a  narrow  compass  his  curiosity,  ambition, 
energy,  and  pride.  But  within  those  limits  he  had  lived 
with  greater  comfort  and  less  anxiety  than  we  are  living, 
without  racking  his  brains  to  invent  or  to  understand 
something  new  every  day,  not  spurred  on  every  hour  to 
produce  at  greater  speed  and  in  greater  abundance,  not 
exasperated  by  the  multitude  of  his  needs  nor  agitated 
from  morning  to  night  by  the  pursuit  of  the  means  to 
satisfy  them.  But  after  the  discovery  of  America  and 
the  first  great  astronomical  discoveries  which  shed 
glory  on  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  there 
arose  in  man  the  first  sparks  of  ambition  to  seek  new 
ways  in  the  world  outside  the  ancient  limits.  The 
philosophies  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries, 
and   still   more    the   first    discoveries   of   science,    lent 


12    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

boldness  to  these  ambitions.  One  day  men  realised 
that  Prometheus,  that  clumsy  thief,  had  stolen  from 
the  gods  only  a  tiny  spark  of  the  fire.  They  planned 
a  second  robbery,  discovered  coal  and  electricity,  and 
invented  the  steam-engine.  And  behold!  the  French 
Revolution,  which  confounded  and  upset,  from  one 
end  of  Europe  to  the  other,  boundaries,  laws,  institu- 
tions, and  traditions — ideal  and  material  limits.  Then 
at  last  man  realised  that  he  could  conquer  and  exploit 
the  whole  earth  with  iron  and  fire.  At  the  same  time 
as  liberty,  a  new,  untiring,  formidable  eagerness  in- 
vaded the  two  worlds.  All  the  limits  which,  for  so 
many  centuries,  had  confined  in  a  narrow  circle  the 
energy  and  aspirations  of  even  the  most  highly  vener- 
ated of  men  fell  one  after  the  other  to  the  ground. 
They  fell,  because  the  human  mind  could  not  have 
launched  out  into  the  unknown  to  essay  so  many  new 
marvels  if  those  ancient  limits  which  imprisoned  it  had 
remained  standing.  The  multitude  would  not  have 
bowed  their  necks  to  the  hard  discipline  of  their  new 
work,  if  in  compensation  they  had  not  been  liberated 
from  other,  more  ancient,  disciplinary  restrictions. 

In  short,  the  great  era  of  iron  and  fire  began,  in 
which  the  principle  of  liberty  was  destined  to  assault 
the  principle  of  authority  in  its  last  entrenchments, 
and  to  drive  it  right  away  to  the  farthest  frontiers  of 
political,  moral,  and  intellectual  anarchy.  But  for 
this  very  reason  the  era  of  iron  and  fire  has  seen  the 
gradual  confusion  and  reduction   to  wavering  uncer- 


What  Is  Proo^ress?  13 


& 


tainty  of  all  the  criteria  which  served  to  distinguish 
the  beautiful  from  the  ugly,  the  true  from  the  false, 
good  from  evil.  These  criteria  have  become  confused 
because  they  are  and  can  be  nothing  else  but  limits; 
limits  which  are  precise  and  sure  so  long  as  they  are 
restricted,  but  become  feeble  the  more  they  are  en- 
larged. But  how  can  a  century,  which  has  made  itself 
so  powerful  by  dint  of  overturning  the  ancient  limits 
on  every  hand,  be  expected  to  respect  these  limits  in 
the  spiritual  v/orld?  As  a  result  we  find  a  civilisation 
which  has  built  railways,  studded  the  Atlantic  with 
steamers,  exploited  iVmerica,  and  multiplied  the  world's 
riches  a  hundredfold  in  fifty  years, — we  find  it  obsessed 
by  grotesque  doubts  and  eccentric  uncertainties  with 
regard  to  the  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey,  in  which  generation 
after  generation,  accustomed  to  respect  amongst  other 
limits  those  imposed  by  literary  traditions,  had  unhesi- 
tatingly agreed  to  recognise  two  masterpieces  composed 
by  a  poet  of  genius.  So  we  see  the  epoch  which  has 
overturned  and  destroyed  so  many  thrones  and  altars 
and  made  Reason  and  Science  march  in  triumph 
through  the  smoking  ruins  of  a  score  of  revolutions, — ■ 
we  see  it  obsessed  on  a  sudden  by  a  thousand  scruples, 
halt,  ask  itself  what  is  truth,  whether  it  exists,  and  if  it 
can  be  recognised.  We  see  it  rack  its  brains  to  decide 
whether  what  we  know  is  a  real  and  objective  something 
or  only  a  creation  of  our  fancy.  All  these  scruples  and 
doubts  are,  as  it  were,  the  brow  of  a  slope  down  which 
our  epoch  slides  at  headlong  speed  towards  the  abyss 


14    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  Amerira 

of  nothingness.  And  in  the  century  which  has  given 
man  Hberty,  the  certainty  of  food,  comfort  in  abun- 
dance, and  so  many  guarantees  against  the  oppression 
of  individuals  and  authorities  as  were  known  to  no 
previous  century;  in  the  century  which,  by  overthrow- 
ing so  many  Hmits,  has  banished  from  our  midst  so 
many  reasons  for  hatred  and  war,  do  we  not  hear  a 
thousand  voices  on  every  side  cursing  man  for  a  miser- 
able slave  and  accusing  the  times  of  being  corrupt; 
crying  that  conditions  must  be  purified  with  fire  and 
sword,  according  to  some,  with  war,  according  to  others, 
with  revolution?  Having  once  transgressed  the  limits, 
man  has  become  insatiable.  The  more  he  possesses,  the 
more  he  wants.  He  no  longer  acknowledges  any  re- 
straint in  his  desires. 

The  quantity  which  vanquishes  quality,  the  liberty 
which  vanquishes  authority,  the  desires  which  blaze 
out  anew  each  time  they  are  satisfied — these  are  the 
forces  and  the  phenomena  which  shape  and  fashion 
our  civilisation.  For  this  reason  we  can,  it  is  true, 
accumulate  vast  hordes  of  wealth  and  conquer  the 
earth  with  iron  and  fire.  But  we  must  resign  ourselves 
to  living  in  a  new  Tower  of  Babel,  in  the  midst  of  a 
confusion  of  tongues.  The  aesthetic,  intellectual,  and 
moral  confusion  of  our  times  is  the  price  nature  exacts 
for  the  treasures  which  she  is  obliged  to  resign  into  our 
power.  This  book  and  its  successor  have  been  written 
with  the  object  of  throwing  light  on  the  obscure  but 
vital  bond  which  links  together  in  a  living  unity  the 


What  Is  Prof^ress?  15 


most  diverse  phenomena  of  contemporary  life.  They 
have  not  been  written,  as  some  have  thought,  with  the 
view  of  comparing  the  ancient  and  the  modem  civilisa- 
tions, Europe  and  America,  to  the  detriment  of  the  one 
or  of  the  other;  much  less  with  the  view  of  denouncing 
the  regime  of  liberty,  on  the  ground  that  it  corrupts  the 
world,  and  of  demanding  that  it  be  suppressed.  To 
find  fault  with  the  tendency  of  a  civilisation,  one  must 
postulate  the  fact  that  history  has  gone  wrong.  And 
what  criterion,  what  standard  is  there  which  justifies 
a  man  in  declaring  to  successive  generations  that  they 
ought  to  have  held  different  objects  in  view,  and 
adopted  other  means  to  attain  them? 

No:  the  author's  only  object  has  been  to  sound  the 
depths  of  life,  in  the  hope  of  tracing  that  unity  from 
which  flow  forth  and  into  which  flow  back  again  so 
many  apparently  diverse  phenomena;  that  unity  in 
which  alone  thought  can  find  some  respite  from  its 
weary  search  after  the  secret  of  its  own  being  and  of 
that  of  things  in  general.  Without  a  doubt  each  one 
of  us  attains  only  provisional  success  in  his  search  for 
this  unity ;  but  is  not  every  work  of  man  only  provisional, 
and  what  are  we  but  beings  destined  to  live  only  for 
an  instant?  Therefore,  I  have  endeavoured  in  this 
book  to  reveal,  by  way  of  an  analytical  and  rational 
exposition,  set  out  in  the  simplest  and  plainest  terms, 
the  vital  bond  of  this  unity.  But,  inasmuch  as  a  unity 
is  a  synthesis,  and  analysis  necessarily  modifies  and 
disfigures  while  trying  to  explain,  I  have  availed  myself 


i6    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

in  my  other  work  of  what  is  perhaps  the  most  effective 
method  of  representing  the  phenomena  of  Hfe  in  their 
synthesis:  I  mean,  art.  For  this  reason  I  have  written 
a  dialogue,  in  which  I  have  made  my  characters  begin 
by  wandering  haphazard  over  a  wide  field  and  jumping, 
apparently  at  random,  from  one  to  another  of  a  series 
of  widely  different  topics.  But  at  the  end  the  various 
topics  are  gathered  into  a  united  whole,  showing  the 
bond  which  unites  them,  in  the  speeches  of  the  most 
acute  and  intelligent  of  the  passengers;  especially  in 
that  speech  which  coincides  with  the  entry  of  the  ship 
from  the  open  Atlantic,  the  free  high-road  of  the  new 
world,  into  the  Mediterranean,  the  confined  arena  of 
ancient  civilisation.  Livre  desordonne  et  pourtant  bien 
ordonne  is  the  verdict  of  a  French  critic,  Andre  Maurel. 
How  glad  I  should  be  if  all  my  readers  subscribed  to 
this  verdict!  In  truth,  this  tragic  conflict  of  the  two 
worlds,  of  the  two  civilisations,  of  man  with  himself, 
for  licence  to  dispense  with  the  limits  of  which  he,  in 
fact,  has  need  if  he  is  to  enjoy  the  most  exquisite  fruits 
of  life,  is  a  picture  so  vast  as  to  overtax  the  resources 
of  the  painter.  But  the  painter  has  worked  at  his 
canvas  with  so  much  ardour  and  passion  that  he  hopes 
to  find  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic,  as  on  this, 
readers  willing  to  view  the  defects  in  his  work 
with  the  intelligent  indulgence  of  which  really  cul- 
tured men  are  always  so  liberal;  readers  prompt  to 
feel  some  quickening  in  response  to  the  few  sparks 
of  beauty  and  of  truth  which  the  author  may  have 


What  Is  Progress?  17 

succeeded  in  Infusing  into  his  work.  It  is  a  small 
thing,  no  doubt.  But  do  not  even  the  tiny  rivulets 
which  flow  through  the  valleys  unite  to  form  the 
mighty  rivers  in  the  plain? 


Part  II 

Ancient     History    and    the     Modern 
World 


19 


ANCIENT  SOCIAL  SYSTEMS  AND  CONTEMPORARY  AMERICA 

A  T  the  end  of  the  year  1906,  while  sojourning  in 
'**  Paris,  where  I  had  been  giving  at  the  College  de 
France  a  course  of  lectures  on  Roman  history,  I  re- 
ceived an  invitation  from  Emilio  Alitre,  the  son  of  the 
famous  Argentine  general,  to  undertake  a  long  expedi- 
tion to  South  America.  This  invitation  evoked  general 
surprise.  What,  my  friends  asked,  was  I,  the  historian 
of  the  ancient  world,  going  to  do  in  the  newest  of  new 
worlds,  in  ultra-modern  countries,  in  countries  without 
a  past  and  caring  only  for  the  future,  where  industry 
and  agriculture  fill  the  place  which  for  the  ancients  was 
occupied  by  war?  Why,  if  I  was  willing  to  leave  my 
studies  and  my  books  for  one  moment,  did  I  not  repair 
to  Egypt  or  the  East,  the  scene  ot  so  much  of  the  history 
which  I  had  recounted,  where  the  Romans  have  left  so 
many  traces  of  the  world  which  has  passed  away,  and 
where  so  many  important  excavations,  tending  to 
enrich  history  with  new  documentary  evidence,  are  in 
progress? 

I  answered  my  questioners  by  pointing  out  that  I  was 


22     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

not  a  bookworm,  whose  interest  was  confined  to  ancient 
books  and  archaeological  parchments;  that  life  in  all 
its  aspects  interested  me,  and  that  I  was,  therefore, 
curious,  after  devoting  so  much  attention  to  ancient 
peoples,  to  study  awhile  the  most  modem  of  nations, 
the  newest  comers  in  the  history  of  our  civilisation. 
Did  my  friends  suppose  that,  because  I  had  written  a 
history  of  Rome,  I  had  pledged  myself  never  again  to 
direct  my  gaze  to  modern  life?  But,  though  I  explained 
the  reason  for  my  voyage  in  this  way,  I,  no  less  than 
my  friendly  objectors,  was  convinced  at  that  time  that 
my  travels  in  America  would  be  only  a  parenthesis  in  my 
intellectual  life.  In  other  words,  I  thought  that  I  was 
going  to  America  in  search  of  an  intellectual  diversion, 
hoping  for  some  relaxation  for  my  mind,  obsessed  for 
the  last  ten  years  by  ancient  history,  in  bringing  it  to 
bear  on  an  entirely  different  world.  That  this  diver- 
sion would  be  useful  to  me,  I  had  no  doubt;  but  not 
because  America  might  help  me  to  a  better  under- 
standing of  ancient  Rome,  but  because  to  change  every 
now  and  again  the  subject-matter  of  my  studies  and  to 
enrich  my  mind  with  new  impressions  always  seemed 
to  me  one  of  the  most  profitable  intellectual  exercises, 
especially  for  a  historian  to  whom  a  wide  experience  of 
human  nature  is  a  necessity.  To-day,  after  having 
made  not  one,  but  two  journeys  to  America,  after  having 
seen  not  only  the  two  largest  and  most  flourishing  states 
of  South  America,  but  also  that  North  America  which, 
more  than  all  the  other  states  of  the  New  World,  re- 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems    23 

presents  in  the  eyes  of  contemporaries  the  more  mod- 
ern part  of  our  civilisation,  the  reign  of  machinery',  the 
empire  of  business,  the  rule  of  money,  I  am  no  longer 
of  this  opinion.  It  is  my  present  belief  that  a  journey 
in  the  New  World  is  of  supreme  benefit  intellectually  to 
a  historian  of  the  ancient  world;  and  that,  in  order  to 
understand  the  life  and  history  of  Greek  or  Roman 
society,  it  is  perhaps  just  as  important  to  visit  the 
countries  of  America  as  Asia  Minor  or  Northern  Africa. 
That  is  what  I  said  on  one  of  the  last  days  of  my  stay 
in  the  United  States  to  a  genial  professor  of  ancient 
history  connected  with  Cornell  University,  with  whom 
I  was  discussing  the  most  famous  schools  of  the  present 
day  for  the  pursuit  of  historical  studies,  and  the  methods 
adopted  in  these  schools.  "Many  of  you  Americans," 
I  said,  "go  to  European  universities  to  study  ancient 
history.  It  seems  to  me  that  you  might  well  invite 
many  European  professors  to  come  and  go  through  a  fin- 
ishing course  in  America,  studying  not  only  in  libraries 
but  in  the  live  world,  and  observing  what  happens 
in  American  society.  Nobody  is  in  a  better  position 
than  are  you  to  understand  ancient  society. "  My 
remark  may  seem  at  first  sight  a  paradox.  But  it  is  no 
paradox,  if  one  goes  to  the  root  of  the  problem.  For 
what  we,  men  of  the  twentieth  centun^',  call  ancient 
civilisations,  were  really,  when  they  flourished,  new  and 
young  civilisations,  with  but  few  centuries  of  histor}^ 
behind  them;  and  so  are  the  American  civilisations  of 
the  present  day.     For  this  reason,  we  find  in  ancient 


24     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

civilisations,  on  however  much  reduced  a  scale,  many 
phenomena  which  are  now  peculiar  to  American  social 
systems;  while  we  should  look  for  them  in  vain  in 
European  civilisation,  which  has  more  right  to  call  itself 
ancient  civilisation  than  have  the  civilisations  of  Greece 
and  of  Rome.     This  I  propose  briefly  to  prove. 

One  of  the  social  phenomena  which  are  most  charac- 
teristic of  North  America,  but  which  would  be  looked 
for  in  vain  in  Europe,  is  the  munificence  of  the  donations 
of  wealthy  men  to  the  public.  Families  of  great  wealth 
in  America  nowadays  feel  it  incumbent  on  them,  as  a 
social  duty,  to  spend  a  part  of  their  substance  on 
the  people;  to  encourage  education  and  culture,  to 
bestow  benefactions,  to  help  the  more  needy  classes, 
and  to  assist  with  their  purses  the  public  authorities  in 
the  execution  of  their  functions.  In  Europe,  the  case 
is  different.  Large  fortunes  may  be  numerous,  but 
they  are  kept  more  in  the  background  than  in  America. 
Rich  men  are  much  more  selfish  in  the  enjoyment  of 
their  riches.  Even  the  richest  are,  as  a  rule,  content 
to  leave  some  small  sum  in  their  wills  to  the  poor,  or  to 
some  educational  institution.  But  donations  in  excess 
of  four  thousand  pounds  are  rare,  and  make  a  great 
stir.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  certain  sections  of  society 
in  Europe  accuse  the  upper  classes  of  selfishness  and 
hold  up  before  them  American  generosity  as  an  example 
to  follow.  But  this  censure  is  exaggerated,  for  the 
times  and  the  social  conditions  are  different  in  Europe. 
The    history    of    the    ancient    world    shows    that    this 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems    25 

generosity  on  the  part  of  the  rich  is  a  phenomenon 
peculiar  to  a  certain  stage  in  the  development  of  society, 
which  recurs  in  all  flourishing  and  prosperous,  but  as 
yet  not  very  ancient,  societies.  In  these,  some  of  the 
public  functions  are  assum.ed  by  the  rich,  because  the 
State  has  not  yet  had  the  time  to  bring  them  under  its 
control  and  to  direct  them  according  to  laws  by  it 
established.  If  the  millionaires  of  America  have,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  but  few^  imitators  in  Europe,  they  can 
boast  numberless  forerunners  in  the  histories  of  Greece 
and  Rome.  In  Athens  to  begin  with,  and,  later,  in 
the  Roman  Empire,  to  mention  only  the  most  famous 
states  of  the  ancient  world,  education,  charity,  public 
amusements,  even  public  works,  such  as  roads,  theatres, 
and  temples,  were  always  in  part  left  by  the  State  to 
the  generosity  of  wealthy  individuals,  who  felt  it  their 
duty  to  contribute  out  of  their  means  to  the  public 
welfare. 

Amongst  the  inscriptions  which  have  reached  us 
from  the  Roman  world,  and  which  have  been  collected 
in  the  Corpus  Inscriptionum  Latinarum,  we  find  a 
considerable  number  referring  to  these  donations.  In 
all  the  provinces  of  the  vast  Em])ire,  in  all  the  cities 
great  and  small,  stories  have  been  found  recounting, 
often  in  forcible  terms,  the  donation  by  some  citizen, 
during  his  life  or  at  his  death,  of  a  certain  sum  to  the 
city,  it  might  be  to  construct  or  repair  an  edifice,  it 
nrh,^ht  be  to  distribute  grain  to  the  people  in  time  of 
dearth,  or  to  give  bounties  of  oil  on  festive  occasions. 


26     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

or  to  assure  to  the  people  the  enjoyment  of  certain 
periodical  spectacles,  or  to  supplement  the  finances  of  the 
city,  which  had  been  thrown  into  disorder  by  excessive 
expenditure,  or  which  were  not  equal  to  all  the  calls 
made  upon  them.  Every  city,  then,  had  her  own 
millionaire  benefactors,  her  little  Camegies,  her  Hunt- 
ingtons,  Morgans,  and  Rockefellers  in  miniature,  whose 
generosity  was  necessary  to  the  public  good,  and  to 
whom  were  raised  in  gratitude  monuments,  many  of 
which  have  come  down  to  our  time. 

The  Roman  Emperor  himself  was,  at  first  at  any 
rate,  only  the  most  generous  and  the  best  known  of 
these  rich  donors:  a  kind  of  Carnegie,  Morgan,  and 
Rockefeller  of  the  Empire.  Suetonius,  for  instance, 
tells  us  what  sums  Augustus  spent  in  the  course  of  his 
life,  out  of  his  private  patrimony,  on  public  objects. 
Augustus  himself ,  in  the  famous  Monumentum  Ancyra- 
num,  the  great  inscription  found  in  Asia,  in  which  he 
gives  a  clear  resume  of  the  story  of  his  life,  enumerates 
many  of  the  gifts  which  he  made  to  the  public  out  of  his 
own  pocket.  On  several  occasions,  he  simply  liquidated 
the  deficit  in  the  Empire's  budget  out  of  his  private 
purse.  At  another  time,  he  repaired  at  his  own  expense 
the  roads  of  Italy  which  after  the  civil  wars  had  through 
neglect  fallen  into  disrepair.  On  countless  occasions,  he 
spent  money  for  public  works,  for  the  relief  of  famine,  for 
popular  amusements,  for  all  the  forms  of  beneficence 
then  customary,  without  paying  any  regard  to  the 
serious  inroads  he  was  making  on  the  fortune  which  he 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems    27 

would  have  to  leave  to  his  own  heirs.  This  is  exactly 
what  many  wealthy  men  are  doing  to-day  in  the  New 
World.  It  would  be  in  accord  with  the  facts  to  say 
that  those  striking  largesses  were  one  of  the  means  by 
which  imperial  authority  was  gradually  concentrated 
at  the  heart  of  the  Roman  State,  and  surrounded  itself 
with  so  much  gratitude,  so  many  interests,  and  so  many 
hopes  as  to  be  able  definitely  to  secure  the  principal 
position  amongst  all  the  organs  of  the  State. 

But  if  the  Emperor  was  the  most  generous  of  the 
public  benefactors,  he  was  not  the  only  one.  The  chief 
men  throughout  the  Empire  followed  his  example,  some 
of  them  on  so  elaborate  a  scale  as  to  challenge  compari- 
son with  the  most  munificent  American  millionaires, 
when  account  is  taken  of  the  difference  in  the  standards 
of  riches  in  the  respective  epochs.  The  best-known 
figure  among  these  donors  is  Herodes  Atticus,  an  im- 
mensely rich  Athenian  of  the  second  century  a.d. 
What  was  his  origin,  and  whence  he  got  his  money,  we 
do  not  know.  Probably  he  belonged  to  one  of  those 
families  which  had  accumulated  immense  property  in 
the  provinces,  during  the  first  century  of  the  Christian 
era,  a  century  of  rapidly  acquired  and  great  fortunes. 
This  much  is  certain,  that  he  applied  himself  to  study, 
and  became  what  was  then  called  a  rhetor,  corre- 
sponding more  or  less  closely  to  what  we  term  a  professor 
of  literature,  not  however  with  a  \-iew  to  earning  a 
livelihood,  but  with  the  object  of  cultivating  his  own 
and  other  people's  minds.     Highly  cultured,  erudite, 


28     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  at  the  same  time  one  of  the  richest  men  in  the 
Empire,  Herodes  was  a  great  friend  of  Antoninus  Pius 
and  of  Marcus  Aurehus.  But,  great  as  was  his  reputa- 
tion for  wisdom  and  literary  taste,  and  notwithstanding 
the  enhancement  of  his  prestige  through  the  friendships 
of  the  two  celebrated  emperors,  he  left  a  name  in  the 
social  history  of  the  Roman  world  more  particularly  be- 
cause of  the  vast  sums  he  gave  away  all  over  the  Empire. 
At  Athens,  he  repaired  in  a  splendid  way  the  most  ancient 
and  famous  buildings  of  that  celebrated  city.  He  pre- 
sented, repaired,  and  maintained  theatres,  aqueducts, 
temples,  and  stadia  in  the  cities  of  Greece  and  Italy. 
For  the  rest,  several  of  the  most  highly  admired 
buildings  and  most  imposing  ruins  in  Rome  are  actually 
gifts  made  to  the  public  by  ancient  citizens.  Out  of 
them  all,  I  may  cite  the  Pantheon,  that  marvellous 
Pantheon,  which  we  all  still  admire  in  the  heart  of 
Rome,  the  monument  which  stands  deathless  while  the 
stream  of  ages  flows  by.  This  was  constructed  by 
Agrippa,  the  friend  of  Augustus,  at  his  own  expense,  and 
can  be  compared  in  this  respect  to  Carnegie  Hall  in  New 
York.  Agrippa  built  the  Pantheon  from  the  same 
notions  of  civic  zeal  that  impelled  Carnegie  to  endow 
New  York  with  his  great  Hall.  And  the  two  monu- 
ments, built  by  the  personal  munificence  of  two  ultra- 
wealthy  citizens,  with  an  interval  of  twenty  centuries 
between  them,  express  the  same  desire  to  extend  to  the 
whole  people  a  share  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  donor's 
private  fortune. 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems    29 

Naturally,  my  earliest  studies  in  Roman  history  led 
me  to  fix  my  attention  on  this  bountiful  munificence  on 
the  part  of  private  persons  in  the  ancient  world,  by 
which  the  rich,  either  spontaneously  or  at  the  call  of 
public  opinion,  took  upon  themselves  a  share  of  the 
public  burdens.  But  I  had  not  fully  grasped  the  mean- 
ing of  this  system,  until  I  visited  America,  and  saw  the 
colleges,  schools,  and  hospitals  founded  and  subsidised, 
the  museums  and  universities  endowed,  and  all  the 
other  public  institutions  aided  with  millions  of  dollars 
by  the  rich  business  men  and  bankers  of  America. 
For  Europeans,  living  on  a  continent  where  nowadays 
the  State  has  almost  monopolised  these  functions  and 
exercises  them  zealously,  seeming  to  resent  the  inter- 
ference of  private  persons,  it  is  difficult  to  picture 
correctly  a  social  system  in  which  private  generosity  is 
at  once  possible  and  necessary,  the  advantages  by 
which  such  generosity  is  accompanied,  and  the  manner 
in  which  it  is  exercised. 

The  munificence  of  the  wealthy  citizens  is  only  a 
special  instance  of  a  more  general  and  more  extensive 
phenomenon  in  which  America  approaches  more  nearly 
to  the  ancient  world  than  Europe;  I  mean,  in  that  her 
society  is  less  essentially  bureaucratic.  In  the  ancient 
world,  there  was  no  bureaucratic  organisation  in  any  of 
tlie  Greco- Asia  tic  monarchies  founded  by  Alexander  or 
in  the  latest  period  of  the  Roman  Empire  which  could 
be  considered  to  resemble  even  remotely,  on  a  smaller 


30     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

scale  and  merely  in  broad  outlines,  that  which  flourishes 
in  the  Europe  of  to-day.  Now,  in  the  most  splendid 
moments  of  Greek  and  Roman  history,  we  find  states 
in  which  all  the  public  functions,  even  the  executive 
ones,  were  elective ;  so  that  they  all  changed  periodically 
according  to  the  whims  of  an  electoral  body.  The  need 
for  technical  training  and  professional  education  for 
the  exercise  of  certain  executive  functions  was  so  little 
recognised  that  even  the  command  of  the  military 
forces  and  the  chief  magistracy  were  filled  by  public 
election.  A  general  became  a  general,  not  in  the  course 
of  his  professional  career,  but  at  the  will  of  the  people, 
assembled  in  the  comitia;  and  with  generals  chosen  in 
this  way,  Rome  conquered  the  world.  It  is  impossible 
to  imagine  a  social  constitution  in  more  striking  con- 
tradiction to  the  social  constitution  of  contemporary 
Europe,  which  entrusts  all  the  executive  functions  to  a 
bureaucracy  professionally  trained,  formed  into  a  rigid 
hierarchy,  and  dependent  on  the  State,  over  which  the 
people  have  practically  no  power.  Men  in  Europe 
become  generals  or  judges  because  they  have  studied 
the  art  of  war  or  law  in  special  schools,  not  because  the 
majority  of  an  electoral  body  have  thouglit  it  opportune 
to  entrust  the  office  to  an  individual  who  has  been 
clever  enough  to  appeal  to  them  more  strongly  than  do 
his  rivals. 

This  difference  was  and  is  one  of  the  greatest  diffi- 
culties met  with  by  European  historians  in  the  study  of 
the  ancient  world.     I  am  of  opinion,  for  example,  that 


Ancient  and  iVIodern  Social  Systems    31 

this  is  one  of  the  weakest  points  in  Mommsen's  history. 
Accustomed  to  see  bureaucratic  states  at  work,  Euro- 
pean historians  find  it  difficult  to  imagine  how  those 
states  can  have  prospered  in  which  the  magistrates 
changed  periodically,  sometimes  every  year,  and  in 
which  there  was  no  professional  division  between  the 
different  functions.  Instinctively,  they  tend  also  to 
paint  the  ancient  state  in  the  colours  of  the  European 
state,  attributing  to  it  the  same  virtues  and  the  same 
defects,  and,  therefore,  representing  its  weaknesses  as 
well  as  its  merits  in  a  false  light.  For  an  American,  on 
the  other  hand,  especially  for  a  North  American,  the 
difficulty  of  understanding  the  ancient  states  is 
much  less  formidable.  Certainly  the  principle  of  pro- 
fessional specialisation  is  much  more  highly  developed 
in  modern  American  society  than  it  was  in  the  an- 
cient societies.  IVIodern  civilisation  is  nowadays  too 
complex  and  too  technical  to  admit  of  the  principle 
of  popular  election  being  applied  indiscriminately,  as 
at  Athens  or  Rome,  to  all  the  public  offices.  What 
sensible  man  would  consent  to-day,  even  in  the 
purest  of  democracies,  to  the  election  of  the  admirals, 
for  instance,  by  universal  suffrage?  Nevertheless, 
in  the  American  confederation  many  of  the  public 
offices,  which  are  now  entrusted  in  Europe  to  the 
professional  bureaucracy,  are  elective.  And  this  fact 
by  itself  is  enough  to  represent  a  distinct  rap- 
prochement  between  American  society  and  ancient 
society. 


32     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  iVmerica 

For  this  reason,  an  inhabitant  of  New  York  can  more 
easily  than  an  inhabitant  of  London  or  Paris  picture  to 
himself  certain  aspects  of  the  life  of  the  Athens  or  Rome 
of  ancient  days;  especially  the  continual  and  frequent 
succession  of  elections,  and  the  complete  change  of 
interests  and  of  directing  forces  involved  in  the  change 
of  the  magistrates  in  office.  It  is  true  that  we  in  Europe 
have  periodical  elections,  as  in  America.  Periodically, 
in  the  Old,  as  in  the  New  World,  the  people  assemble 
to  exercise  their  sovereign  right  by  means  of  the  ballot. 
But  if,  regarded  superficially,  the  act  and  the  procedure 
are  identical,  their  value  and  importance  are  different. 
The  populace  in  the  old  states  of  Europe  elect  only 
consultative  and  legislative  bodies,  while  the  executive 
power  remains  to  a  great  extent  independent  of  the 
people,  residing  in  a  professional  bureaucracy  whose 
members  cannot  be  changed  from  day  to  day. 

In  America,  on  the  contrary,  as  in  ancient  Athens  and 
Rome,  many  of  the  magistrates  who  hold  in  their  hands 
and  exercise  directly  governing  powers  are  periodically 
changed  at  the  will  of  the  people,  which,  therefore, 
moulds  more  directly  the  government  and  its  different 
organs  and  more  directly  inspires  and  controls  its 
particular  ftmctions,  just  as  it  used  to  control  them  in 
the  ancient  states. 

It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  we  find  ancient  Rome 
reappearing  in  one  of  the  most  important  juridical  insti- 
tutions of  the  United  States,  an  institution  which  we 
should  search  for  in  vain  in  Europe,  great  mistress  of 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems     33 

laws  though  she  be  accounted.  One  of  the  American 
institutions  which  seems  to  Europeans  most  contrary 
to  the  modern  spirit,  and  for  that  reason  most  deserving 
of  severe  blame,  is  the  right  of  "injunctions"  with 
which  American  magistrates  are  invested.  To  Europe, 
where  the  bureaucracy,  though  immovable  and  little 
subject  to  control,  cannot  step  outside  the  precise 
prescriptions  of  the  law  in  the  exercise  of  its  functions, 
this  discretionary-  power  of  the  American  magistrates 
seems  little  less  than  an  instrument  of  intolerable 
tyranny.  A  brilliant  European,  who  is  a  distinguished 
professor  of  literature  in  one  of  the  universities  of  North 
America,  but  who,  notwithstanding  a  very  lengthy 
sojourn  in  the  American  republic,  has  preserved  intact 
the  ideas  and  the  spirit  of  the  Old  World,  said  to  me  one 
day  in  New  York :  "In this  land  of  liberty,  there  is  one 
tyranny  more  terrible  than  all  the  tyrannies  of  Europe, 
that  of  the  judicial  power!"  That  a  magistrate  should 
have  the  power  to  give  orders,  be  they  of  only  momen- 
tary validity,  which  are  the  expressions  of  his  own  will 
and  not  of  the  letter  of  the  law,  seems  to  the  European 
a  monstrous  thing,  a  relic  of  the  ancient  tyrannies, 
which  harmonises  but  ill  with  republican  institutions. 

A  historian  of  the  ancient  world,  on  the  other  hand, 
is  in  a  position  to  understand  more  easily  this  seeming 
contradiction.  The  injunction  is  nothing  else  than  the 
edict nni  of  the  Roman  magistrate;  the  power,  that  is  to 
say,  which  the  Roman  magistrate  possessed,  and  which 
the   American   magistrate,   maybe    in   a    less    degree, 


34     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

possesses,  of  making  good  with  his  personal  authority 
the  lacunae  and  deficiencies  in  the  law,  on  every  occa- 
sion when  public  order  or  the  principles  of  justice  seemed 
to  demand  it  urgently.  In  the  eyes  of  ancient  Rome,  the 
magistrate  was  not  only,  as  in  the  bureaucratic  states 
of  Europe,  the  cautious  and  impartial  servant  and 
executor  of  the  law.  He  was  also  the  living  personifica- 
tion of  the  State  and  of  the  general  interest,  invested 
with  full  powers  of  exercising  his  own  judgment,  over 
and  above  the  laws,  on  behalf  of  the  State  and  of  the 
general  interest,  when  the  law  was  found  wanting.  In 
short,  by  reinforcing  the  authority  of  the  magistrates, 
the  ancient  states  endeavoured  to  make  amends  for  the 
weakening  of  the  State  which  was  bound  to  ensue  from 
the  continual  electoral  changes  and  the  instability  of 
all  the  offices;  while  Europe,  on  the  other  hand,  which, 
with  her  rigid  bureaucracies,  has  made  the  power  of  the 
State  so  strong,  can  rigorously  limit  the  powers  of  her 
functionaries  with  laws  of  immense  scope.  But  one 
last  remnant  of  the  ancient  conception,  tempered  by 
the  modern  spirit  of  the  State,  survives  in  North  Amer- 
ica, where,  the  elective  principle  being  more  extensively 
applied  than  in  the  states  of  Europe,  the  tendency  is, 
by  way  of  compensation,  to  reinforce  by  some  discretion- 
ary power,  like  the  "injunction,"  some  at  least  of  the 
judicial  offices.  Perhaps  we  may  explain  in  this  way 
the  fact  that  some  European  writers  in  the  nineteenth 
century  have  ventured  to  assert  that  the  ancients  never 
knew  what  liberty  was,  even  in  what  were  apparently 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems     35 

the  most  democratic  republics;  while  others  have 
maintained  that  more  liberty  is  to  be  found  in  the  con- 
stitutional monarchies  of  Europe  than  in  the  authori- 
tative American  republics. 

Another  instance  still  more  curious  is  afforded  us  by 
those  dictators  who,  under  varying  titles  and  with 
varying  success,  have  appeared  in  almost  all  the  repub- 
lics of  Sjjanish  xVmerica,  after  the  emancipation  of  these 
territories  from  the  mother  country.  The  latest  of  these 
dictators  was  Porfirio  Diaz,  who  governed  Mexico  for 
so  many  years.  Europe  has  never  i)roperly  imderstood 
these  dictators.  She  has  mistaken  them  for  carica- 
tures, now  of  Nero,  now  of  Napoleon,  and  has  drawn 
the  conclusion  that  the  republics  in  question  were 
impregnated  with  the  disease  of  tyranny,  and  could  not 
exist  in  a  state  of  liberty.  But  a  historian  of  the 
ancient  world  recognises  at  once  in  these  dictators  a 
modern  incarnation  of  a  figure  which  constantly  appears 
in  ancient  history,  the  Greek  rvpawo'i,  the  Roman 
princeps.  Pisistratus  and  Augustus,  not  Nero  and 
Napoleon,  are  the  prototypes  of  these  dictators.  States 
based  on  an  electoral  system  which  is  not  controlled  by 
organised  parties  or  by  other  social  forces  calculated  to 
ensure  its  working  in  conformit}'  with  precise  and  cer- 
tain rules,  are  subject  to  eruptions  of  disorder,  which 
end  in  establishing  the  personal  power  of  that  individ- 
ual who  succeeds  in  making  the  political  and  adminis- 
trati\'e  machine  work  with  comparative  regularity. 
Augustus   was   throughout    forty-one   years   re-elected 


36    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

every  five  or  ten  years  head  of  the  repubHc,  because  he 
had  succeeded,  by  his  influence  and  personal  ability,  in 
making  the  machine  of  the  comitia  and  senate  run 
smoothly,  at  a  time  when  the  Roman  aristocracy,  which 
had  controlled  it  for  centuries,  could  no  longer,  owing 
to  its  own  discords,  do  so.  The  reason  why  the  power  of 
Augustus  was  prolonged  and  extended  in  all  directions 
until  it  became  a  dictatorship  for  life,  cloaked  under 
legal  forms,  was  that  he  alone  seemed  capable  of  ensur- 
ing a  wise  government  and  of  preventing  civil  wars. 
And  was  not  just  this  the  real  reason  for  the  long  tenure 
of  power  by  Porfirio  Diaz  in  Mexico,  and  for  his  pro- 
longed presidency,  which  was  merely  a  dictatorship 
masquerading  under  republican  forms?  Anyone  who 
wishes  to  understand  the  government  of  Mexico  during 
the  last  forty  years  might  find  the  history  of  Augustus 
of  great  service;  just  as  a  profound  knowledge  of  the 
recent  history  of  Mexico  might  help  to  the  understand- 
ing of  the  ancient  history  of  Augustus. 

A  profound  study  of  ancient  history  is,  therefore,  an 
excellent  preparation  for  the  rapid  understanding  of 
certain  parts,  at  any  rate,  of  the  American  constitution 
and  of  American  society ;  just  as  a  knowledge  of  Amer- 
ica should  be  an  excellent  aid  to  the  study  of  ancient 
history.  In  fact,  in  the  course  of  my  travels  and  obser- 
vations in  America,  after  having  devoted  ten  years  to 
the  study  of  a  large  section  of  ancient  history,  I  have 
realised  how  much  the  ancient  history,  which  I  had 
studied  in  Europe,  helped  me  to  understand  America; 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems     37 

and  how  much  the  America  which  I  had  before  my  eyes 
helped  me  to  a  better  understanding  of  the  distant 
reality  of  that  vanished  world  of  long  ago.  And  if  we 
follow  the  track  of  these  studies  and  reflections,  I  think 
that  we  shall  be  able  to  attribute  also  a  more  precise 
meaning  to  that  epithet  of  "young,  "  which  is  constantly 
applied  to  America.  Who  does  not  talk  a  hundred 
times  a  year  of  old  Europe  and  young  America?  Now 
what  do  these  two  much-used  and  much-abused  epi- 
thets mean?  That  Europe  has  a  longer  history  than 
America?  In  that  case  the  contrasting  terms  would 
not  mean  much.  For  that  is  a  simple  chronological 
statement,  which  only  demands  a  knowledge  of  the 
fact  that  America  was  not  discovered  till  1492  a.d. 
Do  they  mean  that  America  is  more  vigorous,  more 
active,  more  daring  than  Europe,  just  as  3'oung  men 
usually  possess  these  qualities  in  a  greater  degree  than 
the  old?  As  a  matter  of  fact,  many  people  do  use  the 
two  adjectives  in  this  sense.  But,  in  that  case,  they 
assume  as  proved  one  of  the  most  complex,  one  of  the 
deepest  and  most  difficult  problem.s  of  modern  life, 
that  is  to  say,  the  problem  whether  a  comparison  can 
be  struck  between  Europe  and  America,  and  if  so,  on 
the  basis  of  what  criterion?  That  there  should  be  those 
who  strike  this  comparison  and  resolve  it  in  this  way, 
is  not  surprising.  But  no  one  will  be  found  to  pre- 
tend that  the  judgment  contained  in  those  two  words 
"young"  and  "old,"  thus  interpreted,  can  or  ought  to 
be  accepted  as  true  by  everyone. 


38     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  possible  to  agree  on  a  more 
narrow  and  precise  interpretation  of  these  words;  to 
say  that  America  is  young  and  Europe  old,  because 
America  reproduces  some  of  the  characters  and  pheno- 
mena which  we  find  in  antiquity,  that  is  to  say,  in  the 
remotest  epochs  of  our  history.  European  civilisation, 
as  the  result  of  her  migration  to  America,  there  to  found 
new  states  and  societies,  has  really  become,  in  a  certain 
sense,  regenerated,  because  she  has  again  become,  in  the 
light  of  certain  characteristics  and  certain  institutions, 
what  she  was  twenty  centuries  ago.  And  if  the  "youth " 
of  America  is  understood  in  this  sense,  it  is  not  rash 
to  argue  that  it  too  will  grow  old.  The  study  of 
ancient  history  can  be  of  a  certain  practical  value  to 
those  who  consider  America  with  the  object  of  divining, 
in  this  great  community,  the  tendencies  and  inclinations 
of  the  future.  For  students  of  that  history  can  bring 
a  plausible  criterion  of  prevision  to  their  observations. 
In  fact,  it  is  not  rash  to  suppose,  at  least  if  some  un- 
known force  does  not  unexpectedly  divert  the  course  of 
events  in  the  New  World,  that  all  the  parts  of  American 
life  and  society  which  most  resemble  ancient  society  are 
destined  to  disappear  gradually,  as  America  grows  older 
and  elaborates  a  complex  and  artificial  civilisation; 
just  as  the  ancient  institutions  and  ideas  of  which  we 
find  so  many  traces  in  America  gradually  disappeared 
in  Europe  in  the  progress  of  time,  as  civilisation  in  the 
Old  World  became  artificial  and  complex.  If  this 
prophecy  is  not  fallacious,  we  should  expect  history, 


Ancient  and  Modern  Social  Systems    39 

which  eternally  repeats  herself,  to  require  the  man  of 
the  New  World  to  witness  the  same  phenomena  whose 
more  gradual  realisation  they  have  already  witnessed 
in  the  ancient  world.  In  the  New  World  also,  we 
should  expect  to  see  a  society  regulated  by  elective  and 
authoritative  institutions  gradually  become  bureau- 
cratic and  at  the  same  time  fetter  every  branch  of 
political  and  administrative  powers  with  the  tight 
bonds  of  rigid  juridical  principles.  This  will  be  a  slow, 
but  profound  transformation,  in  the  course  of  which 
many  things  will  change  their  position  and  value. 
Perhaps  the  inexhaustible  public  munificence  of  the 
millionaires  will  become  exhausted,  and  the  State  will 
grow  in  prestige  and  influence,  if  not  in  power. 


II 

QUANTITY   AND   QUALITY 

OUETONIUS  recounts  that  one  day  a  man  presented 
^  himself  to  the  Emperor  Vespasian,  and  showed 
him  the  models  of  a  machine,  thanks  to  which  the 
Emperor  could  have  finished  off  the  construction  of 
certain  of  his  great  public  works  with  fewer  labourers, 
and  at  a  great  saving  of  expense.  Vespasian  was  full 
of  praise  for  the  man's  ingenuity,  and  recompensed  him 
with  a  sum  of  money;  but  he  subsequently  had  the 
model  destroyed,  saying  that  he  did  not  wish  to  have 
any  machines  which  would  cause  his  people  to  go 
hungry.  Applying  the  standard  of  modern  ideas,  how 
should  we  judge  this  sentiment  and  act?  Of  course,  we 
should  consider  it  a  strange  and  absurd  mistake.  Sue- 
tonius, on  the  contrary,  quotes  the  incident  to  prove 
how  wise  Vespasian  was.  In  this  divergence  of  opinion 
is  revealed  the  essential  difference  between  ourselves 
and  the  ancients,  between  modern  civilisation  and 
Greco-Roman  civilisation,  for  all  that  these  resemble 
each  other  in  so  many  particulars;  the  principal  differ- 
ence between  the  ancient  world  and  America.   Although, 

40 


Quantity  and  Quality  41 

as  I  have  shown  in  my  preceding  essay,  America  in  cer- 
tain of  its  institutions  and  forms  of  social  Kfe  resembles 
the  ancient  world  more  than  Europe,  this  comparison 
does  not  hold  true  so  far  as  the  instruments  of  economic 
production  are  concerned.  In  this  respect  America  is 
much  further  removed  from  the  ancient  world  than  is 
Europe,  and  represents  to-day  the  beginning  of  a  new 
era  and  a  new  civilisation,  whose  spirit  and  tendencies 
would  be  quite  incomprehensible  to  a  re-embodied 
Greek  or  Roman. 

Greco-Roman  antiquity  never  dreamed  that  it  might 
be  a  useful,  beautiful,  glorious  work  to  invent  machines 
of  increasing  speed  and  power,  and  therefore  never  gave 
a  thought  to  those  technical  elaborations  which  are  the 
pride  of  our  times.  It  possessed  the  elementary  ma- 
chines, the  lever,  jack-screw,  the  inclined  plane;  but 
it  never  tried  to  combine  these  into  more  compHcated 
machines.  In  particular,  it  never  called  into  play  the 
effort  to  which  all  the  mechanism  of  modern  times  owes 
its  birth;  that  is  to  say,  it  never  tried  to  endow  its 
machines  with  a  more  rapid  motion  than  the  muscles 
of  men  or  of  animals  can  endow  them  with,  or  to  search 
nature  for  motive  forces  of  greater  power  than  these. 
It  availed  itself  only  sparingly  and  on  rare  occasions 
of  the  force  of  running  water  or  of  the  wind.  The 
latter  it  used  only  for  navigation,  and  even  then  with 
regret,  hesitation,  and  fear,  as  if  it  were  doing  an  illicit 
and  shameful  thing.  It  knew  of  no  combustible  other 
than  the  wood  of  the  trees.     Xoiwiihstanding  the  fact 


42     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

that  Pliny  the  elder  has  preserved  for  us  so  much 
precious  information  about  agriculture  and  the  ancient 
arts  and  industries,  his  writings  contain  scarcely  a 
single  hint  suggesting  that  the  men  of  his  civilisation 
had  any  desire  to  make  the  instruments  of  economic 
production  more  perfect  and  effective.  In  one  place, 
the  sail,  as  compared  with  the  oar,  inspires  him  to 
write  a  passage  in  which  the  modem  reader  imagines 
just  at  first  that  he  has  lighted  on  a  sentiment  con- 
taining a  distant  echo  of  contemporary  enthusiasm  for 
progress.  "  Is  there  a  greater  marvel  in  the  whole 
world?  "  he  writes. 

A  grass  exists  [flax,  of  which  sails  are  made]  which  brings 
Egypt  and  Italy  so  close  together  that  two  prefects  of 
Egypt,  Galerius  and  Balbillus,  crossed  from  Alexandria  to 
the  straits  of  Messina,  one  in  seven  days  and  the  other  in 
six;  and  that  last  summer  the  senator  Valerius  Marianus 
reached  Alexandria  from  Pozzuoli  in  a  light  wind  in  nine 
days.  There  is  a  grass  which  brings  me  in  seven  days  from 
Gades,  the  harbour  near  the  Pillars  of  Hercules,  to  Ostia, 
in  four  from  this  side  of  Spain,  in  three  from  the  province 
of  Narbonne,  in  two  from  Africa,  as  C.  Flavius,  the  envoy 
of  the  proconsul  Villus  Crispus,  found. 

Does  it  not  seem  as  if  we  were  reading  an  anticipation 
by  eighteen  hundred  years  of  that  hymn  which  moderns 
so  often  raise  to  the  power  of  steam  and  to  the  great 
ocean  liners  which  cross  the  Atlantic  in  five  or  six  days? 
But  ours  is  only  a  brief  illusion.  The  wonder  and  the 
admiration  of  Pliny  are  soon  over,  and  a  sort  of  awe 
takes  their  place.     "  Audax  vita,  .seder urn  plena!''  he 


Quantity  and  Quality  43 

quickly  adds.  "Creature  full  of  wicked  daring!"  The 
invention  of  sails  seems  to  him  almost  a  sacrilegious 
impiety,  and  his  view  was  that  of  all  the  ancients. 

In  short,  the  few  victories  which  the  ancients  had 
won  over  nature  were  to  them  a  cause  of  embarrass- 
ment rather  than  of  enthusiasm;  for  they  saw  in  them 
merely  a  proof  of  the  perversity  and  foolhardiness  of 
human  pride.  If  a  contemporary  of  Sophocles  or 
Horace  came  back  to  the  world,  he  would  probably 
just  at  first  be  terrified  by  what  he  saw  all  round  him, 
as  by  the  spectacle  of  a  gigantic  and  unheard-of  mad- 
ness. Machinery,  which  to  us  seems  the  m.ost  mar- 
vellous instrument  of  our  energy  and  intelligence, 
appeared  to  the  ancients  a  danger,  an  enemy,  and 
almost  a  sacrilege :  an  attempt  to  rebel  against  the  gods 
and  their  wishes.  Consecjuently,  they  invented  and 
adopted  machines — and  those  but  simple  and  primitive 
ones — only  for  use  in  war,  especially  for  siege-work. 
The  necessity  of  conquering  made  them  forget  to  some 
extent  their  usual  fears. 

So  great  a  difference  in  thought  and  feeling,  in  a 
matter  which  to  us  seems  of  such  vital  importance, 
must  arise  from  deep-seated  causes.  Why  did  the 
ancients  invent  and  construct  so  few  machines,  and  hold 
in  such  fear  the  few  they  had?  "Why  did  they  wish  the 
hand  of  man  to  be  the  principal  and  the  most  powerful 
among  the  instruments  of  ])roduction?  Many  attribute 
the  inferiority  of  the  ancients  in  this  department  to  the 
comparatively  undeveloped  state  of  science.     Vast  and 


44     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

profound  knowledge  of  science,  they  say,  is  required 
for  the  construction  of  modern  machines.  The  ancients 
did  not  possess  this  knowledge;  therefore,  they  conclude, 
they  could  not  construct  the  machines. 

But,  in  this  deduction  there  are  two  exaggerations. 
The  services  of  science,  especially  in  early  times,  to 
machines  and  their  progress,  are  exaggerated;  so  also 
is  the  scientific  ignorance  of  the  ancients.  Science  has 
helped  materially  to  perfect  certain  machines,  but  has 
actually  invented  scarcely  one.  Many  of  the  mar- 
vellous machines  which,  at  a  giddy  rate,  multiply  riches 
all  round  us,  have  been  conceived  for  the  first  time  in 
the  minds  of  artisans,  contre-mattres,  managers  of  fac- 
tories, and  other  persons  more  expert  in  practice  than 
rich  in  scientific  lore.  The  founder  of  the  great  me- 
chanical industry,  Arkwright,  who  invented  the  cotton- 
spinning  machine,  was  a  barber.  Watt,  the  inventor 
of  the  steam-engine,  though  perhaps  a  better-educated 
man  than  Arkwright,  was  not  in  any  sense  a  great 
scientist.  For  the  rest,  whoever  knows  the  history  of 
machinery  is  aware  that  science  did  not  begin  to  con- 
cern herself  with  machinery,  or  to  inquire  whether  her 
studies  might  help  inventors  with  useful  suggestions, 
until  the  great  mechanical  industry  had  already  invaded 
the  world.  Science,  then,  only  followed  a  movement 
which  had  already  begun,  and  did  not  give  it  the  first 
impulse. 

Furthermore,  the  scientific  ignorance  of  the  ancients 
is  exaggerated.     Ancient  science  is  not  so  well-known 


Quantity  and  Quality  45 

as  ancient  art  and  literature;  and  it  certainly  did  not 
make  very  striking  progress  during  the  last  brilliant 
period  of  ancient  history — the  Roman  Empire.  There- 
fore to  many,  whose  knowledge  regarding  it  is  compara- 
tively superficial,  the  ancient  world  may  seem  empty 
of  scientific  wisdom.  But  such  is  not  the  case.  If  the 
Romans  never  apj^lied  much  thought  to  the  scientific 
study  of  nature,  the  Greeks  for  their  part  had  laid  the 
foundations  of  many  sciences,  and  had  laid  them 
boldly  and  truly.  Even  the  Copernican  system  had 
been  anticipated  by  Greek  astronomers,  like  Aristarchus 
of  Samos  and  Seleucus  of  Seleucia,  who  had  maintained 
that  the  earth  revolved  round  the  sun,  and  that  the 
firmament  was  much  more  vast  than  was  generally 
supposed. 

We  need  not,  therefore,  believe  that  the  ancients 
were  not  able  to  construct  more  complicated  machines 
than  those  they  used,  because  they  lacked  scientific 
knowledge.  It  would  be  nearer  the  truth  to  say  that 
they  did  not  make  much  effort  to  raise  sciences  out  of 
the  necessarily  narrow  domain  of  purely  theoretical 
problems,  because,  independent  as  they  were  of  ma- 
chinery, they  had  no  need  of  the  practical  aids  which 
science,  if  developed  in  certain  directions,  can  lend  to 
the  construction  of  machines.  In  fact,  we  men  of  the 
present  day  encourage  the  sciences  to  search  and  inves- 
tigate in  every  direction  and  to  try  every  path,  not 
from  a  disinterested  love  of  the  True  nor  from  an 
intellectual  curiosity  to  spy  out  the  mysteries  of  nature; 


46     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

but  because  we  hope  that  we  shall  discover,  in  the 
course  of  our  all-embracing  search,  laws  or  bodies  or 
forces  which  will  help  us  to  subdue  and  exploit  nature. 
The  ancients  then  abstained  from  inventing  and 
constructing  machines,  not  from  lack  of  knowledge  but 
from  lack  of  will.  The  effort  seemed  to  them  useless, 
nay,  pernicious;  and  the  enterprise  did  not  attract 
them.  It  remains,  therefore,  to  consider  why  the 
ancients,  in  their  great  struggle  to  extend  the  dominion 
of  man  over  nature,  felt  no  need  of  help  from  swift 
engines  of  iron,  and,  therefore,  did  not  make  the  effort 
necessary  to  invent  them.  This  is  a  question  of  the 
highest  importance  for  the  history  of  civilisation,  for 
by  its  solution  only  can  we  gain  an  insight  into  what  is 
perhaps  the  most  profound  difference  between  ancient 
and  modern  civilisation.  The  difference  consists  in 
this:  while  our  civilisation  is  a  mechanical-scientific 
civilisation,  the  ancient  was  above  all  things  an  artistic 
civilisation.  Therefore  our  civilisation  tends  in  the 
main  to  multiply  the  needs  and  the  consumption  of 
man,  so  as  to  quicken  production  as  much  as  possible, 
while  the  ancient  civilisation  tended  to  limit  man's 
needs  and  consumption,  to  hold  up  to  esteem  and 
imitation  customs  of  simplicity  and  parsimony  which 
involved  a  reduction  in  consumption,  and  therefore  in 
production.  If  we  are  to  grasp  the  very  essence  of  our 
history,  we  must  understand  clearly  how  indis- 
solubly  united  arc  the  artistic  civilisation  and 
the    ideal    of  a    simple    life,    the    mechanical -scientific 


Quantity  and  Quality  47 

civilisation   and   the  ideal  of   a   life   of   extravagance 
and  luxury. 

Even  at  the  present  day,  many  will  be  found  to  extol 
th(^  greatness,  the  wealth,  and  the  might  of  the  Roman 
Empire  as  a  marvel  never  surpassed  in  history.  But 
this  is  a  delusion.  The  Roman  Empire  seemed  mar- 
vellously wealthy  and  powerful  to  the  ancients,  because 
they  had  never  yet  seen  greater  wealth  and  greater 
might.  But  what  are  the  wealth  and  the  m.ight  of 
the  Roman  Empire  compared  with  the  might  and  the 
wealth  of  the  great  modern  states  of  Europe  and 
America?  One  observation  will  suffice  to  give  an  idea 
ot  the  difference.  We  are  justified  in  deducing  from  the 
great  number  of  facts  and  data  in  our  possession  that 
in  the  most  flourishing  and  wealthy  centuries  the 
budget  of  the  Empire,  the  sum  total,  that  is,  of  all  the 
items  of  expenditure  which  the  central  government  at 
Rome  had  to  meet — expenditure  on  the  most  impor- 
tant public  services  of  so  immense  an  empire,  which 
comprised  the  whole  basin  of  the  Mediterranean,  and 
a  large  part  of  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa — fell  short,  far 
short,  of  the  municipal  budget  of  the  city  of  New 
York.  Only  the  man  who  is  conversant  with  the 
customs  of  the  past  in  their  minutest  details  can 
fully  estimate  how  much  simpler,  poorer,  and  more 
economical  the  civilisation  of  the  ancients  was  than 
that  which  has  permeated  America  and  Europe 
since  the  invention  of  the  steam-engine  and  elec- 
tricity, when  the  riches  of  the  New  World,  exploited 


48     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

intensively    with   the   help   of   machinery,   began    to 
flood  the  earth. 

Consuming  little,  and  content  with  a  life  of  sim- 
plicity and  poverty,  the  ancients  had  no  need  to  pro- 
duce much  or  to  produce  at  great  speed.  So  they  had 
no  requirement  for  machines,  whether  steam-  or  elec- 
tricity-driven. The  few  simple  machines,  which  the 
hand  of  man  or  the  muscular  force  of  domestic  animals 
can  operate, — the  domestic  loom,  the  horse-propelled 
mill, — sufficed.  Therefore,  they  had  no  need  of  science 
to  help  them  to  construct  new  machines  of  greater 
size  and  power.  They  had  no  need  to  work  at  high 
pressure.  They  could  work  slowly,  with  their  hands 
and  with  a  few  simple  instruments,  and  with  them  pro- 
duce beautiful,  accurate,  and  finished  articles,  which 
aspired  to  a  lofty  and  difficult  ideal  of  perfection. 
Accordingly,  art  occupied  in  the  ancient  world  the 
position  which  science  occupies  in  modern  civilisation. 
It  was  not  a  refined  luxury  for  the  few,  but  an  elemen- 
tary and  universal  necessity.  Governments  and  wealthy 
citizens  were  obliged  to  adorn  their  cities  with  monu- 
ments, sculptures,  and  pictures,  to  embellish  squares, 
streets,  and  houses,  because  the  masses  wished  the  cities 
to  be  beautiful,  and  would  have  rebelled  against  an 
authority  which  would  have  them  live  in  an  unadorned 
city;  just  as  nowadays  they  would  rebel  against  a 
municipal  authority  which  would  have  them  dwell  in 
a  city  without  light,  or  against  a  government  which 
placed  obstacles  and   hindrances  in   the   way   of   the 


Ouantity  and  Quality  49 

construction  of  railways.  In  those  times,  the  require- 
ment was  that  everything,  down  to  the  household 
utensils,  even  of  the  most  modest  description  and 
destined  for  the  use  of  the  poorer  classes,  be  inspired 
with  a  breath  of  beauty.  Anyone  who  visits  a  museum 
of  Greco-Roman  antiquities,  in  winch  are  exposed  to 
view  objects  found  in  rich  and  highly  cultivated  dis- 
tricts,— that  of  Naples,  for  example,  where  so  many 
objects  excavated  from  the  ashes  of  Pompeii  are  to  be 
seen, — can  easily  convince  himself  of  this  curious 
phenomenon,  and  realise  more  vividly,  by  contrast,  the 
carelessness,  roughness,  and  commonplace  vulgarity  of 
the  objects  made  by  modern  machinery.  In  short,  if 
the  quantity  of  the  things  produced  by  the  industry 
of  the  ancients  was  small,  for  that  very  reason,  and 
by  way  of  compensation,  their  quality  was  refined  and 
excellent. 

The  contrary  is  the  case  in  the  modern  world. 
The  quantity  of  the  things  which  modern  industry, 
thanks  to  electricity-  and  steam-driven  machinery, 
produces,  is  prodigious.  Xo  century  ever  witnessed 
the  realisation  of  the  miracle  of  abundance  in  a 
more  marvellous  way.  But  the  quality  of  the  things 
suffers  in  consequence.  The  ugliness  and  the  crude 
vulgarit}-  of  so  many  objects,  which  in  much  poorer 
times  had  an  elegance  and  a  beauty  which  have  now 
vanished,  are  the  price  we  pay  for  the  ;ibundancc  of  our 
times.  The  necessities  of  man  have  increased  beyond 
all  measure,  and  to  satisfy  them  lavish  and  rapid  pro- 


50     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

duction  is  required.  The  need  for  rapid  production 
accounts  for  the  invention  of  so  many  machines.  But 
it  is  not  possible  to  secure  the  manufacture  by  rigid 
hands  of  iron  of  so  many  things  at  such  speed,  and  at 
the  same  time  to  impart  to  them  an  exquisitely  artistic 
appearance,  revealing  the  personal  excellence  of  the 
artist.  It  is  as  much  as  we  can  do  to  impart  to  them  a 
coarse  and  rude  appearance  of  beauty,  with  a  few 
ornamentations  copied  casually  from  the  beautiful 
things  which  our  fathers  succeeded  in  creating  in 
poorer  and  less  busy  times.  Machinery,  driven  by 
steam  or  electricity,  has  the  advantage  of  speed  over 
the  hand  of  man.  It  can  produce  in  the  same  time  a 
much  greater  number  of  objects.  For  this  reason  it  has 
triumphed  in  a  time  like  ours,  in  which  the  increased 
necessities  of  the  world  demand  an  extraordinary 
growth  in  production.  But  the  hand  of  man, — that 
living  and  mind-inspired  machine, — if  it  cannot  com- 
pete with  machines  of  iron  for  speed,  is  alone  capable 
of  imparting  to  things  that  perfection,  that  grace,  and 
that  excellence  of  form  which  can  fill  us  with  a  joy 
which  is  different  from,  but  perhaps  more  intense  than, 
that  afforded  by  easy  and  coarse  abundance. 

This  contrast  between  ancient  and  modern  times, 
between  the  civilisations  which  preceded  the  French 
Revolution  and  the  modern  American  civilisation,  should 
and  would  have  received  more  attention  than  it  has, 
had  not  the  students  of  antiquity  been  too  prone  to  lose 


Quantity  and  Quality  51 

their  way  in  the  maze  of  a  dead  erudition.  We  are 
proud  of  our  wealth  and  power.  We  are  proud  of 
having  extended  our  dominion  over  the  whole  planet, 
only  a  smiill  part  of  which  was  known  to  the  ancients, 
and  that  but  vaguely.  We  are  proud  of  having  sur- 
prised so  many  of  nature's  secrets,  of  having  deciphered 
the  myster}'  of  so  many  laws,  of  having  thrown  light 
on  so  many  lurking-places  of  disease  and  death,  of 
having  shaken  ourselves  free  from  so  many  vain  fears 
which  tormented  our  ancestors,  of  having  released 
ourselves  from  so  many  yokes— political,  moral,  and 
intellectual^which  used  to  weigh  upon  their  necks. 
We  feel  ourselves  strong,  sure  of  ourselves  and  of  our 
destiny  as  no  men  before  us  in  history,  in  face  of  the 
blind  forces  of  the  Universe,  so  many  of  which  we  have 
subjected  to  our  dominion  and  forced  to  serve  our 
necessities,  our  ambitions,  and  our  whims. 

Nevertheless,  in  the  midst  of  all  this  wealth,  this 
power,  and  this  knowledge,  a  dull  sense  of  disquietude 
vexes  men's  souls.  Alan  is  not  yet  content.  Every  day 
he  finds  new  pretexts  or  motives  for  complaining.  One 
of  the  most  oft -repeated  of  these  pretexts  or  motives  is, 
that  the  world  is  becoming  uglier.  If  in  our  cities  any 
beautiful  part  remains,  it  is  nearly  always  the  old  part. 
In  the  historical  cities,  the  new  parts  arc  horrible,  and 
form  a  strange  contrast  with  the  older.  The  altogether- 
new  cities — especiall}'  those  which  have  s])rung  up  in 
the  last  century  in  America  -ap])car  to  the  artistic  eye 
almost  always  like  a  sort  of  anteroom  to  the  infernal 


52     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

regions.  Architecture  has  become  a  mother  of  mon- 
sters. Sculpture  and  painting,  which  were  once  upon 
a  time  the  two  most  select  amongst  the  decorative  arts, 
protected  and  pampered  by  the  great  ones  of  the  earth 
and  adored  by  the  masses,  are  reduced  to  the  necessity 
of  employing  a  thousand  artifices  to  extort  orders  out 
of  the  negligent  malevolence  of  an  epoch,  whose  orna- 
ments and  monuments  seem  an  encumbrance  and  an 
excrescence  rather  than  a  beauty.  There  was  a  time 
when  the  dress  of  men  and  women  was  a  work  of  art. 
At  the  present  day,  only  that  of  women  has  preserved 
a  certain  artistic  grace  and  beauty.  Let  us  not 
dwell  upon  the  countless  other  forms  of  ugliness  which 
have  invaded  our  houses  with  the  furniture,  the  carpets, 
the  candelabra,  and  the  china. 

The  artistic  mediocrity  of  our  epoch  is  surpassed  only 
by  the  superficiality  and  confusion  of  its  tastes.  Each 
succeeding  year  sees  that  which  used  to  appear  the 
height  of  elegance  and  beauty  to  its  predecessors,  de- 
spised, neglected,  and  forgotten.  All  the  styles  of  the 
past  and  all  the  styles  of  the  different  countries  swirl 
round  us,  before  the  fickle  gusts  of  fashion.  Every 
picture  which  excites  admiration  for  a  moment  is 
quickly  forgotten  by  the  fickle  taste  of  an  age  which 
ransacks  every  corner  in  search  of  the  beautiful,  be- 
cause nowhere  can  the  beautiful  be  found.  Many  ask 
tlicmselves  what  is  the  origin  of  this  strange  corruption 
of  taste  and  of  the  aesthetic  sense.  But  no  two  people 
agree  on    the   answer.     This  one   attributes   the   de- 


Quantity  and  Quality  53 

generation  to  the  decadence  of  traditions,  and  therefore 
proposes  to  open  schools  and  to  institute  courses  of 
instruction.  That  one,  on  the  other  hand,  traces  the 
responsibility  to  the  lack  of  liberty  afforded  the  public 
taste  and  the  genius  of  the  artists,  a  condition  of  things 
for  which  these  same  traditions  are  to  blame.  Such  a 
one  therefore  inveighs  against  the  schools  and  the  rules 
of  tradition,  and  would  like  to  see  them  all  swept  away. 
Nobody  can  explain  how  it  happens  that  so  rich,  so 
wise,  and  so  powerful  a  civilisation  does  not  succeed  in 
being  beautiful,  and  shows  itself  powerless  to  infuse  a 
breath  of  beauty  into  anything  it  creates,  be  it  big  or 
little,  into  its  cities  or  into  the  small  objects  of  daily  use. 
But  the  history  of  civilisation  explains  this  apparent 
mystery.  A  civilisation  cannot  deck  itself  with  the 
most  exquisite  beauties  of  art,  if  it  cannot  persuade 
itself  to  live  with  a  certain  simplicity  and  to  work  with 
a  certain  deliberation.  What  kills  art  in  our  civilisa- 
tion is  the  mad  desire  for  wealth,  the  giddy  increase  of 
necessities,  the  universal  craze  for  speed,  the  effort  to 
multiply  production,  the  general  restlessness  of  body 
and  mind.  Beauty  is  not  so  simple  and  commonplace 
a  thing  as  to  admit  of  its  examples  being  multiplied  by 
machinery  in  furious  haste.  Whether  in  big  things  or 
in  little,  it  can  onJy  be  the  result  of  a  long  and  steady 
effort  of  the  intellect  and  the  will,  which  must  be  ex- 
pressed at  all  costs  through  the  medium  of  that  living 
and  marvellous  machine,  the  human  hand.  If  we  wish 
to  accumulate  round  us   the  wealth  of  the  world  at 


54     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

express  speed,  if  we  wish  to  produce  and  to  consume 
with  giddy  rapidity,  we  must  not  be  too  exacting  in  our 
demands  for  quaHty  and  beauty  in  the  things  produced. 
We  cannot  have  a  great  deal  in  this  world,  and  have 
that  great  deal  beautiful. 

Therefore,  speaking  still  more  generall}^,  we  might 
say  that  in  the  ancient  civilisation  the  dominant  princi- 
ple was  quality,  in  the  modern  civilisation,  on  the  other 
hand,  quantity.  In  ancient  times,  the  more  cultured, 
powerful,  and  wealthy  a  nation  became,  the  greater 
efforts  it  made  to  produce  in  every  branch  of  human 
activity  but  few  things,  but  to  ensure  the  materialisa- 
tion in  those  things  of  a  difficult  and  lofty  ideal  of 
perfection  which  should  find  common  acceptance  and 
admiration.  Men  of  our  time,  on  the  other  hand, 
direct  their  efforts  towards  production  in  large  quanti- 
ties, and  at  great  speed,  and  are  proud  of  seeing  their 
power  and  grandeur  expressed  in  the  formidable  figures 
of  modern  statistics.  That  the  goods  produced  are  of 
deteriorating  quality  is  of  small  account.  Thus  the 
ancient  civilisations  tended,  so  to  speak,  towards 
eternity,  towards  the  manufacture  of  things  which,  if 
not  eternal  in  the  precise  meaning  of  the  word,  should 
last  a  long  time,  should  conquer  the  ages,  and  should 
succeed  in  conveying  to  distant  posterity  a  supreme 
image  of  their  past  existence.  In  very  truth,  after 
numberless  catastrophes  and  pillagings,  the  material 
remains  of  ancient  civilisations,  which  are  piously 
preserved  to  this  day,  arc  very  numerous.    Our  age  pro- 


Quantity  and  Quality  55 

duces  in  great  quantities,  but  maybe  not  a  single  one 
of  the  buildings  and  material  objects  produced  by  it  in 
such  abundance  can  hope  to  conquer  the  ages.  Every- 
thing is  precarious,  ephemeral,  destined  to  live  a  few 
months  or  a  few  years;  destined  to  a  premature  death 
from  the  very  first  hour  of  its  birth. 

And  this  diversity  crops  up  again  in  every  branch  of 
human  activit}';  in  industrial  as  in  intellectual  activity, 
in  art  as  in  literature.  We  look  upon  the  literatures  of 
Greece  and  Rome  as  a  treasure  of  inestimable  value, 
almost  as  the  foundation  of  our  culture;  and  we  still 
recommend  them  as  models  to  all  who  wish  to  learn  the 
difficult  art  of  writing  and  of  speaking  with  precision, 
elegance,  and  clearness.  And  yet  how  little  the  ancients 
wrote  and  read  compared  with  ourselves!  The  press 
did  not  exist ;  paper,  now  the  cheapest  of  materials,  was  a 
rare  luxury — the  papyrus  was  a  most  precious  Egyptian 
monopoly.  Consequently,  the  number  of  persons  who 
could  provide  themselves  with  books  was  very  small, 
and  such  persons  were  found  only  among  the  elite  of 
culture  or  of  wealth.  The  only  opportunities  ot  reading 
the  people  had  were  afforded  by  the  public  notices,  and 
by  the  laws  engraved  on  bronze  or  marble  tablets.  In 
those  times,  there  was  nothing  to  correspond  in  any  way 
at  all  with  the  news]3apers  of  to-day.  In  view  of  the 
very  scanty  numbers  of  the  readers  of  books,  those  also 
who  wrote  them  were  bound  to  be  few  in  number ;  these 
could  not  write  much.  Witli  but  very  few  exceptions, 
the  works  bequeathed  to  us  by  the  ancients  are  by  no 


56     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

means  voluminous.  Of  all  the  qualities  commonly  found 
in  Greek  and  Latin  writers,  sobriety  and  conciseness  are 
the  most  prominent.  These  virtues  were  to  some  extent 
the  product  of  circumstances.  For  in  times  in  which 
paper  was  so  dear,  and  every  copy  of  a  book  had  to 
be  prepared  specially  by  an  amanuensis,  conciseness 
and  brevity  were  the  two  qualities  of  importance  to 
insure  the  wide  circulation  and  preservation  of  a  book. 
It  was,  however,  just  the  circumstance  that  the  an- 
cients wrote  so  little  that  enabled  them  to  carry  the  art 
of  writing  to  an  indescribable  pitch  of  perfection;  that 
enabled  them  to  obtain  that  clearness,  that  harmony, 
that  cadence  and  proportion  of  phrase,  that  concentra- 
tion which  has  made  them  the  great  masters  of  the 
literary  art  for  all  time.  And  to-day! — A  wolfish,  in- 
satiable hunger  for  printed  paper  and  reading  m.atter  is 
the  scourge  of  our  civilisation.  Look  at  the  Panta- 
gruelian  literary  orgies  to  which  Europe  and  America 
surrender  themselves !  Every  day  brings  its  daily  paper, 
every  week  its  journals,  illustrated  or  otherwise,  every 
month  its  reviews  and  magazines.  Then  we  have  the 
special  publications  devoted  to  a  particular  art,  a 
particular  profession,  a  particular  industry,  a  favourite 
sport,  in  number  without  end.  Wc  have,  too,  the 
volumes  of  every  kind  and  quality  with  which  a  crowd 
of  publishers  congests  the  book  market :  novels,  poems, 
books  of  travel,  science,  political  economy,  religion, 
sport.  Who  could  enumerate  all  the  kinds  of  books 
which  are  published  nowadays?     Many  of  these,  it  is 


Quantity  and  Quality  57 

true,  do  not  find  readers,  but  many  do;  and  a  certain 
number,  so  many  readers  as  to  be  sold  in  thousands,  in 
tens  of  thousands,  and  to  be  scattered  broadcast  all 
over  the  world. 

But  to  satisfy  a  public  which  is  so  greedy  of  reading, 
an  extraordinary  number  of  writers  is  required  at  the 
present  day,  from  the  obscure  editors  of  provincial 
journals  to  the  favoured  few  who  succeed  in  winning 
world-fame,  and  in  reaching  the  position  of  sovereigns 
or,  if  you  prefer  it,  satraps  of  literature.  And  all  this 
enormous  multitude  of  writers  is  compelled  to  write 
prolifically  and  rapidly,  because  the  public  wants  to 
read  voraciously.  It  must  choose  diverse  topics,  and 
vary  its  themes  according  to  the  varieties  of  fashion  and 
events.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  no  longer  compelled 
to  be  concise,  both  because  the  public  often  likes  pro- 
lixity, which  makes  reading  comfortable  and  easy,  and 
because,  nowadays,  printing  is  so  cheap  and  facile. 
But  the  art  of  writing  is  being  lost  through  this  haste, 
this  instability  of  public  interest,  this  j)rolixity.  Every 
tongue  is  becoming  a  muddy  mixture  of  words  and 
phrases  which  have  dripped  from  every  point  of  heaven 
on  to  the  daily  language  and  literature.  Taste  is  being 
corrupted,  with  writers  as  with  readers,  deteriorating 
now  into  negligence  and  carelessness,  now  into  affecta- 
tion and  grotesqueness. 

Quality  and  quantity:  these  arc  the  two  principles  of 
the    two   civilisations,    the    ancient    and    the    modern. 


58     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

They  are  two  opposite  principles,  a  circumstance  which 
explains  why  in  the  last  fifty  years  the  gradual  triumph 
of  the  civilisation  of  machinery  or  of  industry  on  a  large 
scale,  which  aims  at  multiplying  the  quantity  of  riches, 
has  been  accompanied  by  a  decline  in  classical  studies. 
The  new  generation,  even  that  portion  of  it  that  repre- 
sents the  educated  classes,  has  broken  away  from  the 
study  of  a  world  which,  though  resembling  the  modern 
world  in  so  many  of  its  ideas  and  institutions,  differed 
from  the  present  era  in  the  fundamental  conception  of 
life,  and  professed  an  entirely  different  idea  of  perfection. 

However,  if  the  two  principles  are  mutually  exclusive, 
we  must  ask  ourselves,  which  is  true  and  which  false, 
which  is  good  and  which  is  not.  Who  is  in  the  right, — 
we,  who  wish  to  fill  the  world  with  riches,  even  at  the 
cost  of  disfiguring  it  and  making  it  hideous;  or  the 
ancients,  who  were  content  to  live  a  life  of  greater  sim- 
plicity, of  more  leisurely  and  more  peaceful  activity, 
but  wished  to  spend  it  in  a  persevering  effort  to  ma- 
terialise their  ideals  of  beauty?  In  how  many  of  the 
confused  disputes  which  set  the  men  of  our  times  by 
the  ears  is  this  problem  obscurely  implied,  though  the 
disputants  are  unaware  of  it?  But  the  problem  is  a 
terrible  one,  because  it  involves  all  the  fundamental 
problems  of  contemporary  life  and  the  very  destiny  of 
the  gigantic  operations  to  which  our  own  generation, 
and  those  which  preceded  it,  have  applied  themselves 
with  such  frenzied  activity. 

So  I  will  not  attempt  to  solve  the  formidable  problem. 


Quantity  and  Quality  59 

Yet  may  I  be  permitted  to  express  a  thought,  simple  in 
itself,  but  one  which  presents  itself  with  the  smiling 
countenance  of  hope.  It  is,  that  "opposite"  principles 
do  not  mean  "irreconcilable"  principles.  Is  it  not 
just  possible  that  this  craze  for  work,  for  riches,  and  for 
speed,  of  which  we  are  victims,  may  slacken  somewhat, 
and  give  men  time  to  collect  their  thoughts,  and  to 
piece  together  again  the  shattered  grandeur  of  the 
modern  world  in  the  image  of  a  more  serene  and  com- 
posed beauty?  Are  men  really  doomed  to  become 
more  insatiable,  the  richer  the}^  become;  or  will  the 
day  arrive  when  they  will  think  it  wiser  to  employ  a 
larger  part  of  the  immense  riches  they  possess,  not  in 
producing  other  riches,  but  in  embellishing  the  world, 
seeing  that  beauty  is  no  less  a  joy  in  life  than  wealth, 
and  that  we  ourselves,  though  all  athirst  for  gold,  prove 
that  it  is  so,  by  searching  untiringly  in  every  corner  for 
the  few  remains  of  ancient  beauty? 

I  feel  that  I  have  not  the  courage  to  answer  this 
question  with  a  brutal  "No";  and  I  hope  that  many 
others  will  be  of  the  same  opinion.  For  one  cannot 
help  thinking  that  one  of  the  most  marvellous  epochs 
in  history  would  really  begin  on  the  day  on  which 
Europe  and  America  succeeded  in  reconciling  in  a  new 
civilisation  the  two  opposite  principles  of  quantity  and 
quality,  and  in  employing  the  extraordinary  riches  at 
their  disposal  in  adorning  and  beautifying  the  world, 
which  their  energy  anrl  :uulacity  have  so  immeasurably 
enlarged  in  recent  centuries. 


in 

WOMAN  AND  HOME 

OOME  years  ago,  in  the  course  of  the  excavations 
^  which  are  being  made  with  such  success  in  Egypt, 
a  papyrus  was  found  which  is  now  known  among 
archaeologists  by  the  name  of  The  Petition  of  Dionysia. 
This  papyrus,  which  belongs  to  the  second  century  a.d,, 
contains  on  one  side  some  books  of  the  Iliad,  on  the 
other  a  defence  presented  by  a  certain  Dionysia  to  an 
Egyptian  court,  before  which  she  was  defending  an 
action  brought  against  her  by  her  own  father  affecting 
her  dowry  and  other  questions  of  interest.  To  escape 
paying  his  daughter  and  her  husband  the  sums  which 
they  demanded,  the  father  had  directed  the  husband 
to  return  him  his  daughter,  and  had  dissolved  the 
marriage.  But  the  daughter,  on  her  side,  maintained  in 
her  defence  that  the  father  had  forfeited  his  right  to 
dissolve  her  marriage  and  to  separate  her  from  her 
husband,  because  her  marriage  was  a  "written"  mar- 
riage— established,  that  is  to  say,  by  an  act  or  docu- 
ment in  writing.  If  it  had  been  an  "unwritten" 
marriage,    Dionysia    would    not    have    contested    her 

60 


Woman  and  Home  6i 

father's  right  in  that  case  to  dissolve  it,  for  no  motive 
whatever,  merely  because  it  so  pleased  him. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  a  document  more 
strange  than  this,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  ideas 
which  prevail  at  the  present  day  in  European  and 
American  society.  Alatrimony  is  for  us  an  act  of  so 
great  social  importance  that  the  state  alone — that  is  to 
say,  the  law,  and  the  law  courts — can  recognise  or 
dissolve  it.  To  leave  the  destiny  of  a  family  at  the 
mercy  of  the  will  of  the  father  of  one  of  the  two  parties, 
to  recognise  as  his  the  right  to  destroy  a  family  at  any 
moment  to  suit  his  individual  interest,  without  being 
accountable  to  anyone  for  so  doing,  would  seem  to  us  a 
monstrous  thing.  And  yet  this  monstrous  thing  seemed 
to  the  whole  of  antiquity,  with  few  restrictions  and 
reservations,  legitimate,  reasonable,  and  wise.  Differ- 
ences in  the  organisation  of  the  family  existed  in 
different  countries  and  in  different  centuries;  but  they 
were  but  superficial,  unessential  differences.  On  one 
point,  the  whole  world  agreed:  that  matrimony  should 
never  be  considered  an  act  to  be  left  to  the  will  of  the 
contracting  parties,  but  a  business  transaction  which 
the  young  people  should  leave  to  their  fathers  to  arrange. 

Matrimony,  as  it  was  in  Rome,  will  serve  to  give  a 
clear  idea  of  the  ancient  world's  conce])tion  of  the 
family.  In  Rome,  fathers  often  betrothed  their  sons 
when  they  were  still  children.  They  made  them  marry 
when  they  were  still  quite  young,  the  males  before  they 
were  twenty,  the  girls  at  about  sixteen;  and  they  had 


62     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  right  to  obhge  them  at  any  moment  to  divorce  each 
other,  without  being  forced  to  give  any  reason  or 
explanation.  A  man  might  be  an  exemplary  husband, 
might  live  with  his  wife  in  the  most  perfect  bliss.  If 
the  son's  wife,  for  one  reason  or  another,  did  not  suit 
the  fancy  of  his  father,  the  son  might  be  obliged  any 
day  to  put  her  away.  Amongst  others  to  whom  this 
happened  was  no  less  a  person  than  Tiberius,  at  a  time 
when  he  had  already  become  one  of  the  first  figures  in 
the  Empire,  and  had  commanded  armies  in  battle.  He 
had  married  a  daughter  of  Agrippa,  and  loved  her 
devotedly.  The  couple  were  considered  in  Rome  a 
model  of  affection  and  faithfulness.  But,  at  a  certain 
moment,  Augustus,  who  was  the  adoptive  father  of  Ti- 
berius, judged  that  for  political  motives  another  marriage 
might  have  suited  Tiberius  better;  and  he,  accordingly, 
obliged  Tiberius  to  divorce  her.  Tiberius  was  so  much 
upset,  that — as  Suetonius  tells  us — every  time  he  met 
his  first  wife  in  society,  he  burst  into  tears — he,  who 
was  one  of  the  most  formidable  generals  of  his  time; 
so  that  Augustus  had  to  take  measures  to  prevent  their 
meeting  each  other.  And  yet  Tiberius  had  to  give  way ; 
for  his  father,  in  the  eyes  of  the  law  and  in  accordance 
with  the  ideas  current  in  his  time,  was  absolute  arbiter 
in  these  matters !  Not  even  a  man  in  the  circumstances 
of  Tiberius,  who  had  already  been  consul,  could  think 
of  rebelling  against  the  paternal  authority. 

These  few  facts  suffice  to  prove  how  often  the  ideas 
which  to  one  epoch  and  to  one  civilisation  seem  the 


Woman  and  Home  63 

most  natural,  the  most  evident,  and  the  most  simple, 
arc,  on  the  contrary,  complex  and  difficult  ideas,  at 
which  mankind  has  arrived  only  after  a  long  effort,  and 
weary  struggles.  Is  there  anything  which  seems  to  us 
more  reasonable  than  to  leave  to  young  people,  who 
wish  to  found  a  family,  ample  liberty  of  judgment  and 
of  choice  in  the  matter  of  the  person  with  whom  they 
will  have  to  pass  their  lives?  Fathers,  it  is  true,  often 
help  their  sons  by  giving  advice.  They  readily  place 
at  the  disposal  of  their  children  their  own  experience. 
But  it  is  only  in  very  rare  instances  that  they  maintain 
a  struggle  d  outrance,  to  withhold  their  children  from  a 
marriage  on  which  their  hearts  are  set,  or  to  force  on 
them  a  repugnant  alliance.  We  consider  that  the 
individual's  happiness  may  depend  to  some  extent  on 
his  marriage.  It  is,  therefore,  just  that  everybody 
should  have  ample  liberty  of  choice.  If  the  law  pur- 
ported to  restore  to  fathers  the  right  to  make  or  unmake 
their  sons'  marriages,  we  are  convinced  that  at  the 
present  day  the  vast  majority  of  fathers  would  refuse 
to  assume  such  a  responsibility,  and  would  consider 
such  a  power  unjust,  excessive,  and  tyrannical.  There 
is  not  a  father  to-day  who,  however  averse  he  may  be 
to  a  marriage  desired  by  his  son  or  daughter,  does  not 
end  by  telling  him  or  her,  provided  a  little  firmness  is 
shown  in  resisting  his  arguments,  that  after  all  it  is  not 
he,  but  his  son  or  daughter  who  has  to  take  the  husband 
or  wife  in  question.  Indeed,  this  inclination  to  pliabil- 
ity on  the  part  of  fathers  towards  their  sons  is  increas- 


64     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

ing  every  day.  Ever}^  day  sees  a  growing  disinclination 
on  the  part  of  fathers  to  fetter,  in  a  matter  ot  such  deH- 
cacy  and  of  such  importance  to  the  personal  happiness 
of  the  young,  the  freedom  of  the  latter's  inclinations, 
the  spontaneous  rush  of  their  feelings.  Besides,  what 
would  be  the  use  of  having  conquered  liberty  in  so  many 
other  spheres,  if  it  were  withheld  in  this  which,  especi- 
ally to  the  young,  seems  the  most  important  of  all :  the 
liberty  of  yielding  to  the  impulse  of  that  passion  which 
at  a  certain  moment  of  life  is  the  strongest  of  all,  love? 
And  yet  no  idea  would  have  appeared  more  absurd 
and  scandalous  to  the  men  of  the  ancient  world,  the 
contemporaries  of  Pericles  and  Caesar.  The  difference 
is  so  radical  and  profound  that  it  must  arise  from  im- 
portant reasons.  In  fact,  whoever  compares  ancient 
with  modern  times  easily  recognises  that  the  rights  of 
sentiment  and  the  principles  of  liberty  have  been  able 
to  triumph  in  modern  society  only  by  virtue  of  a  com- 
plete transformation  in  social  customs  and  ordinances, 
which  has  stripped  the  family  in  our  times  of  much  of 
its  social  importance.  To-day  the  family  is  purely  and 
simply  a  form  of  social  life  in  common.  Man  and 
woman  cannot  live  solitary  lives.  A  powerful  instinct 
impels  them  towards  each  other.  Even  when  the 
instinct  is  not  felt,  or  is  spent,  the  man  needs  to  live  in 
the  company  of  other  human  beings,  to  have  round 
him  a  circle  of  persons  with  whom  he  may  find  himself 
in  relations  of  the  closest  intimacy.  To-day  the  family 
performs  this  profoundly  human  office — this  office  and 


Woman  and  Home  65 

practically  no  other.  Nowadays,  man  and  woman 
study,  work,  take  part  in  government,  compete  for  the 
conquest  of  wealth  and  power,  and  exercise  an  in- 
fluence on  society — engage  in  all  these  activities  quite 
outside  the  family. 

But  it  was  not  so  in  ancient  times.  The  family  was 
then  an  independent  economic  organisation,  in  which 
the  woman  had  a  predominant  part.  She  wove  and 
spun,  providing  every  member  of  the  family  with 
clothes.  She  made  bread,  she  dried  the  fruits  for  the 
winter,  she  seized  the  right  moment  for  laying  in  the 
necessary  supplies  of  provisions — a  most  important 
task,  in  times  in  which  commerce  was  much  less  de- 
veloped than  it  is  now.  In  poor  or  moderately  wealthy 
families,  the  women  wove  and  performed  similar  tasks 
with  their  owm  hands.  Rich  women  learned  to  do  these 
tasks  as  children,  but  later  contented  themselves  with 
superintending  their  performance  by  women  slaves  or 
freedwomen.  But,  especially  in  the  rich  families,  the 
woman  could  contribute  a  great  deal  to  tlie  prosperity 
or  the  ruin  of  the  house,  according  as  she  was  or  was 
not  active  in  the  performance  of  her  work,  zealous  in 
her  surveillance,  energetic  and  shrewd  in  giving  her 
orders,  moderate  in  her  expenditure.  Even  to-day  the 
woman  can  contribute  a  great  deal,  in  the  wealthy 
classes,  to  the  prosperity  of  the  famil}'.  But  for  this 
she  requires  only  one  negative  virtue,  for  all  that  this 
virtue  is  not  too  common  or  easily  accjuired:  to  know 
how  to  confine  her  expenses  within  reasonable  linnts, 
s 


66     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  not  to  be  too  ready  to  gratify  her  whims.  In 
ancient  times,  on  the  contrary,  if  a  woman  was  to  be 
useful  to  her  family  she  needed  as  well  a  positive  virtue : 
to  know  how  to  produce  much  and  well.  This  explains 
how  we  come  to  know  that  certain  emperors'  wives, 
Livia  for  instance,  directed  the  weaving  operations  in 
their  homes  personally  and  with  great  zeal,  and  that 
Augustus  was  particular  not  to  wear  any  togas  but 
those  woven  in  his  house  under  the  eyes  of  his  wife. 
The  Emperor  and  his  wife  by  their  example  mieant  to 
recall  to  all  the  Rom.an  women  the  duty  of  attending 
with  zeal  and  alacrity  to  their  domestic  duties. 

The  ancient  family,  especially  among  the  upper 
classes,  was  also  a  school.  The  ancient  world  had  few 
institutions  of  public  education;  and  private  instruction 
did  not  reach  a  high  level  of  development,  except  in  the 
closing  years  of  the  Empire.  Though  Rome  was  the 
greatest  military  power  in  the  world,  the  family  took 
the  place  of  military  schools,  which  were  then  non- 
existent. The  officers,  who  all  belonged  to  the  nobility, 
were  prepared  in  the  family.  The  father  was  the  first 
military  instructor  of  his  sons,  and  on  him  fell  the  duty 
of  making  good  soldiers  of  them.  This,  indeed,  was 
one  of  the  reasons  why  the  aristocracy  became  indis- 
pensable to  the  Roman  Empire;  because  it  alone  could 
prepare  the  officers  and  generals  in  the  family. 

In  short,  the  ancient  family  was  a  sort  of  political 
society.  Its  members  were  bound  to  support  and  help 
each  other  in  difficult  and  dangerous  contingencies,  to  a 


Woman  and  Home  67 

much  greater  extent  than  they  arc  nowadays.  In 
poHtical  struggles,  for  instance,  they  were  all  of  one 
colour.  It  was  the  most  difficult  and  unheard  of  thing, 
if  indeed  not  impossible,  for  a  son  or  a  son-in-law  to 
attach  himself  to  a  different  political  party  from  that  of 
his  father  or  his  father-in-law.  If  a  member  of  the 
family  was  implicated  in  a  lawsuit,  or  financially  em- 
barrassed, the  family  was  bound  to  help  him  much  more 
energetically,  and  at  much  greater  risk,  than  in  our 
day.  We  see  this  phenomenon  most  clearly  in  Roman 
history.  After  the  aristocracy  split  into  two  opposing 
parties, — the  conservative  and  the  popular,  to  borrow 
modern  expressions, — a  man's  position  in  one  or  the 
other  party  was  determined,  almost  always,  by  his 
birth.  He  belonged  to  one  part}^  or  the  other,  accord- 
ing as  his  own  family  belonged  to  one  or  the  other. 
Take  Caesar,  for  example.  Why  was  Caisar  always 
a  member  of  the  democratic  party,  and  bound  to 
follow  its  vicissitudes,  to  the  extent  of  becoming  its 
leader  and  occasioning  a  civil  war,  overturning  the 
ancient  government,  and  cstabHshing  a  dictatorship 
which,  reviving  as  it  did  the  saddest  memories  of 
Sulla's  reaction,  could  not  fail  to  be  odious  to  the 
majority,  and  which  was  the  cause  of  Caesar's  death? 
It  was  not  the  result  of  any  special  inclination  or  ambi- 
tion of  his  own.  Several  times  he  tried  to  cross  over  to 
the  other  party,  which  had  much  more  power  and 
authority;  or  at  any  rate,  to  reach  an  understanding 
with   it.       But  his   effort  was   of  no  avail.       He  was 


68    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  nephew  of  Marius,  the  most  celebrated  among  the 
leaders  of  the  popular  party,  and  the  one  whom  the 
other  party  most  detested.  The  first  impulse  towards 
the  whole  of  the  great  dictator's  extraordinary  career 
was  given  by  this  relationship;  he  had  in  the  end  to 
bring  about  a  second  revolution,  because  his  uncle  had 
already  caused  one. 

It  is  easy  then  to  understand  for  what  reason,  in 
times  in  which  the  family  performed  so  many  social 
offices  and  was  the  pivot  of  so  many  interests,  marriage 
was  not  considered  as  an  act  to  be  left  to  the  full  dis- 
cretion of  the  young  and  to  their  love,  and  why  the 
fathers  were  conceded  the  right  to  decide  for  them- 
selves in  such  matters.  A  marriage  involved  grave 
political,  economic,  and  moral  responsibilities  for  the 
members  of  both  clans.  Therefore  the  young  people 
were  required  to  sacrifice  to  the  common  interests  of 
their  clan  some  part  of  their  personal  inclinations. 
In  compensation,  they  had  the  advantage,  in  case  of 
danger  and  of  need,  of  being  able  to  count  on  the  family 
much  more  than  they  can  nowadays;  the  family  ar- 
rogated to  itself,  it  is  true,  certain  rights  in  connection 
with  their  choice,  but  in  return  did  not  abandon  them 
to  their  fate  in  the  hour  of  need. 

In  short,  the  ancient  marriage,  organised  though  it 
was  on  lines  which  appear  to  us  tyrannical,  presented 
certain  advantages  which,  if  considered  carefully,  will 
be  seen  to  compensate,  at  least  in  part,  for  the  restricted 


Woman  and  Home  69 

liberty  of  choice.  In  the  great  transformation  of  civi- 
lisation of  which  the  modern  marriage  is  the  product, 
men  have,  it  is  true,  gained,  on  the  one  hand,  greater 
Hberty,  but  have  lost,  on  the  other,  certain  advantages 
wliich,  in  the  ancient  world,  were  guaranteed  to  them  by 
the  closer  and  more  vigorous  solidarity  of  the  family. 
Women,  on  the  contrary,  have  gained  much  more  in  the 
passage  from  the  ancient  to  the  modern  world,  because 
in  exchange  for  what  they  have  gained,  they  have  lost 
practically  nothing.  The  organisation  of  the  modern 
family  is  distinguished  from  that  of  the  ancient  es- 
pecially by  the  much  greater  concessions  it  makes  to 
the  woman.  Feminists  complain  loudly  of  the  present 
condition  of  woman.  It  is  certain,  however,  at  least  to 
anyone  with  any  knowledge  of  the  history  of  the  past, 
that  at  no  epoch  have  women  been  so  little  oppressed 
by  men  and  at  no  epoch  have  they  enjoyed  so  many 
advantages  as  at  present. 

In  fact,  if  in  the  ancient  marriage  so  little  liberty  of 
choice  was  reserved  to  the  man,  it  is  easy  to  understand 
that  not  a  ghost  of  it  was  conceded  to  the  woman.  The 
man  had  in  addition  one  advantage.  Constrained  to 
submit  to  the  will  of  the  father  as  long  as  the  latter  was 
alive,  he  became,  when  the  father  died,  absolute  master 
of  his  wife,  because  he  could  then  repudiate  her  and 
marry  another,  how  and  when  he  chose.  The  almost 
unfettered  liberty  of  divorce,  without  any  motive,  or 
for  the  most  futile  motives,  might  well  be  some  com- 
pensation to  the  man  for  the  subjection  in  which  the 


70     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

father,  while  alive,  kept  him.  For  the  woman,  there  was 
no  compensation  at  all.  As  long  as  her  father  lived, 
she  had  to  obey  the  man  to  whom  her  father  gave  her. 
When  the  father  was  no  more,  she  still  remained  in  the 
power  of  her  husband,  who  could  not  only  repudiate 
her  without  any  motive,  but  even  marry  her  to  another. 
In  the  history  of  Rome,  especially,  the  men  used  and 
abused  this  privilege  in  a  way,  which  to  us  seems  some- 
times ridiculous,  sometimes  revolting,  and  always  ex- 
travagant. Especially  in  the  last  century  of  the  republic, 
when  the  struggles  between  the  parties  became  intense, 
the  most  eminent  statesmen  adopted  the  habit  of  con- 
solidating their  alliances  with  marriages.  Therefore, 
we  sec  every  political  vicissitude  of  importance  shrouded 
in  a  curious  web  of  divorces  and  marriages.  Now  one 
great  man  hands  his  wife  over  to  another,  now  he 
marries  the  other's  daughter,  now  gives  him  his  sister 
to  wife.  The  poor  women  wander  from  one  house  to 
the  other,  change  husbands  from  one  year  to  another, 
with  the  same  facility  with  which,  nowadays,  a  traveller 
changes  his  inn.  For  all  these  marriages  lasted  only  as 
long  as  the  political  combination  on  account  of  which 
they  were  entered  into.  When  the  combination  was 
dissolved,  divorce  broke  up  all  or  most  of  these  families, 
and  the  husbands  set  themselves  to  contract  new 
marriages.  It  was  so  easy  for  the  husband  to  get  a 
divorce.  He  needed  only  to  write  his  wife  a  letter 
announcing    his    intention! 

Life,  then,  was  bound  to  be  not  over-agreeable   in 


Woman  and  Home  71 

Caesar's  time  for  an  affectionate,  delicate,  virtuous 
woman  who  desired  the  quiet  jcjys  of  family  life.  When 
we  contemplate  from  afar  the  historical  grandeur  and 
the  glory  of  ancient  Rome,  we  ought  not  to  forget  the 
multitude  of  hapless  women  which  Rome  was  forced 
to  sacrifice — a  precious  holocaust  indeed — to  her  for- 
tune and  power.  How  many  women's  broken  hearts, 
how  many  women's  shattered  lives  went  to  make  up  the 
foundations  of  Roman  grandeur!  Nevertheless,  even 
the  greatest  evils  are  never  without  some  small  admix- 
ture of  good;  and  that  sorrowful  plight  of  woman  in 
ancient  times,  especially  of  the  Roman  woman,  was 
offset  by  one  advantage  of  which  liberty  has  robbed 
the  woman  of  to-day.  That  is,  that  in  ancient  times,  a 
woman,  whether  fair  or  plain,  clever  or  foolish,  attrac- 
tive or  insipid,  was  certain  to  be  married,  and  that  too 
while  she  was  still  young.  The  husband  could  not 
choose  her;  but  she  was  sure  of  finding  him,  and  that 
without  undue  delay. 

In  fact,  nowhere  in  the  ancient  world  do  wc  find  any 
striking  traces  of  a  feminine  celibacy  like  that  which 
existed  later  under  the  influence  of  Christianity  in  the 
convents,  or  like  that  which  is  to-day  again  coming  into 
prominence  for  social  and  economic  reasons,  without 
any  religious  impress  or  need  of  monastic  vows,  es- 
pecially in  the  great  industrial  countries.  It  seems  that 
women  of  the  upper  and  middle  classes,  if  they  were  not 
positively  deformed  and  physically  unsuited  for  matri- 
monv,   all   married.     Furthermore,   inasmuch  as  mar- 


72     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

riages,  especially  among  the  upper  classes,  were 
arranged  from  political  and  social  motives,  no  account 
was  taken  of  the  beauty  of  the  bride,  but  of  her  social 
position,  her  family,  and  so  on.  Historians  always  tell 
us  how  many  wives  the  numerous  prominent  figures  in 
Roman  history  married,  and  to  what  families  they 
belonged.  But  it  is  rare  for  them  to  tell  us  whether  they 
were  beautiful  or  ugly,  intelligent  or  stupid,  pleasing  or 
unpleasing ;  these  details  seemed  to  them  of  but  trifling 
importance.  One  of  the  few  exceptions  to  this  rule  is 
Livia,  the  last  wife  of  Augustus.  All  the  writers  vie  in 
celebrating  her  rare  beauty  (to  which  the  statues  also 
bear  witness) ,  her  wisdom,  intelligence,  and  virtue.  But 
Livia  seems  really  to  have  been  a  miracle ;  for  it  is  a  fact 
that,  having  married  Augustus  in  her  earliest  youth, 
she  succeeded  in  living  with  him  all  her  life. 

Fifteen  or  sixteen  years  was  considered  the  suitable 
age  for  a  bride.  Sometimes  girls  were  married  when 
they  were  barely  fourteen,  while  nowadays  it  is  rare 
for  a  girl  to  marry  before  she  is  twenty,  and  the 
majority  marry  between  the  ages  of  twenty  and  thirty. 
Furthermore,  in  many  states  of  the  ancient  world  the 
legal  age  for  matrimony,  both  for  the  woman  and  the 
man,  was  much  lower  than  it  is  to-day  in  European  and 
American  legal  codes.  This  is  not  surprising.  In  all 
times  and  in  all  places  in  which  matrimony  is  con- 
sidered not  as  a  personal  matter  of  sentiment,  but  as  a 
social  act  which  must  be  regulated  and  directed  by  the 
parents,  the  object  is  to  marry  off  the  young  people  as 


Woman  and  Home  73 

quickly  as  possible.  Often  they  are  actually  betrothed 
when  they  are  still  children,  and  share  each  other's 
games  of  running  and  jumping.  This  was  a  fairly 
common  practice  in  ancient  Rome  amongst  the  nobil- 
ity, as  it  is  a  thriving  custom  in  the  China  of  to-day. 
Nor  is  it  difficult  to  understand  the  reason  for  this  pro- 
cedure, which,  considered  by  itself,  seems  to  us  extrava- 
gant and  senseless.  Love  in  all  times  and  in  all  places 
is  a  most  intractable  passion.  It  is,  therefore,  more 
easy  in  such  matters,  for  the  elders  to  impose  their  wills 
and  cold-blooded  arrangements,  on  girls  of  fourteen  or 
fifteen  and  boys  of  seventeen  or  eighteen,  than  on 
women  or  men  of  twenty-five.  Naturally  such  pre- 
cocious marriages,  contracted  between  young  people 
who  had  not  yet  had  a  taste  of  the  world,  were  not  free 
from  dangers  and  serious  inconveniences.  But  these 
dangers  and  inconveniences  appeared  to  contemporary 
eyes  less  great  than  those  which  would  have  arisen,  if 
the  young  had  been  left  to  follow  the  dictates  of  their 
own  feelings. 

In  conclusion,  another  advantage  which  the  ancient 
marriage,  with  all  its  many  hardships  and  its  want  of 
sympathy,  assured  to  the  woman  was  what  one  might 
call  the  legal  protection  of  virtue.  Nowhere  was  this 
protection  greater  and  stronger  than  in  ancient  Rome. 
In  Rome,  the  legitimacy  of  a  marriage  did  not  depend, 
as  it  docs  now  in  Europe  and  America,  on  the  fulfilment 
of  certain  formalities  before  a  priest  or  a  magistrate, 
but  on  the  moral  situation  of  the  woman.    An  in<'cmia 


74    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

et  Tionesta  woman,  to  use  the  expression  then  current, 
meaning  a  free-born  woman  of  irreproachable  habits, 
could  live  with  a  man  only  in  the  capacity  of  his  legiti- 
mate wife.  No  formality  in  the  presence  of  any  magis- 
trate was  required.  The  fact  of  living  with  a  man  and 
being  ingenua  et  honesta  sufficed  to  assure  to  a  woman 
and  her  own  children  all  the  rights  appertaining  to  a 
wife  and  to  legitimate  offspring.  On  the  other  hand,  a 
woman  who  had  lived  a  dissolute  life,  had  engaged  in 
certain  employments  considered,  and  justly  considered, 
disgraceful  for  a  woman,  or  who  had  been  convicted 
of  adultery,  could  never  become  a  legitimate  wife  or 
enjoy  the  privileges  and  rights  of  a  legitimate  wife. 
There  was  no  ceremony  before  a  priest  or  magistrate 
which  could  make  a  legitimate  wife  of  her.  She  was  by 
law  a  concubina,  and  in  that  capacity  for  a  long  time  had 
no  rights.  Only  in  the  course  of  time  could  she  hope  to 
get  the  rights,  much  restricted  and  of  little  importance 
as  they  were,  which  the  law  gradually  conceded  to  the 
concubina. 

To  transport  this  ancient  conception  of  matrimony 
into  modern  society  would  doubtless  not  be  possible, 
because  it  contradicts  the  great  democratic  principle  of 
the  equality  of  all  before  the  law,  on  which  our  social 
organisation  rests.  But  considered  by  itself  this  ancient 
conception  of  matrimony  is  without  a  doubt  more 
lofty  and  more  noble,  and  in  particular  more  favourable 
to  the  woman,  than  the  modern  one.  For  it  did  not 
reduce  the  status  of  legitimate  wife  to  what  is  practi- 


Woman  and  Home  75 

cally  a  formality,  but  made  it  the  exclusive  privilege 
of  the  virtuous  woman,  anel  therefore  assured  the 
virtuous  woman  of  a  kind  of  privileged  legal  position, 
protecting  her  effectively  against  the  intrigues  and 
seductions  of  the  attractive  and  gay  women  who,  in  the 
modern  regime,  are  usually  the  more  dangerous  to  the 
peace  and  happiness  of  the  virtuous  women,  the  less 
austere  are  their  habits.  In  ancient  Rome,  the  law 
guaranteed  the  virtuous  woman  that  at  least  no  one  of 
these  women  should  be  able  to  rob  her  of  the  post  of 
honour  which  she  occupied  in  the  family. 

The  comparison  of  the  ancient  marriage  with  the 
modern  marriage  once  more  proves  to  us,  then,  how 
complex  are  human  affairs,  and  how  difficult  it  is  to 
pass  an  absolute  and  definitive  judgment  upon  them. 
Certainly,  at  first  sight,  the  condition  of  the  woman  in 
the  ancient  family  seems  to  us  a  horrible  one,  resembling 
that  of  a  slave.  We  wonder  how  nations  that  had  risen 
to  a  lofty  level  of  social,  intellectual,  and  moral  develop- 
ment could  have  tolerated  it.  But  when  we  consider 
the  matter  more  attentively,  we  find  that  even  this 
condition,  wretched  though  it  was  in  certain  respects, 
was  not  without  certain  advantages,  which  may  per- 
haps explain  to  us  why  women  put  up  with  it  for  so 
many  centuries.  The  liberty  which  the  woman  of  the 
present  day  enjoys  has  countless  advantages;  but  it  has 
made  matrimony  for  her  a  struggle,  in  which,  if  some 
triumph,  others  are  worsted,  and  those  who  triumph 
are  not  always  the  most  \irtiunis  and  the  most  wise. 


76     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Also,  in  this  order  of  things,  Hberty  is  an  excellent  thing, 
especially  for  the  fortunate  and  the  brave;  but  the 
fortunate  and  the  brave,  where  marriages  and  love  are 
concerned,  are  not  always  those  who  possess  the  quali- 
ties which  conduce  most  effectively  to  the  progress  of 
the  world  and  the  improvement  of  the  human  species. 
Modern  liberty  has  set  a  high  price  on  beauty  and 
intelligence  in  woman,  which  is  all  to  the  good;  but  it 
has  also  made  coquetry,  frivolity,  and  vapidity  into 
qualities  which  are  useful  for  the  conquest  of  man,  who 
is  not  always  a  reasonable  being  and  is  even  less  reason- 
able than  usual  when  he  is  in  love — which  is  not 
all  to  the  good.  For  there  is  no  doubt  that  between 
twenty  and  thirty  years  of  age  a  man  is  much  more 
sensitive  to  the  attractions  of  a  frivolous  and  seductive 
girl  than  to  those  of  a  serious  and  sensible  woman. 

All  human  things,  then,  have  their  advantages  and 
their  disadvantages,  and  that  perhaps  is  why  the  world 
never  tires  of  its  experiments  in  diverse  directions  and 
on  every  topic.  Absolute  perfection  is  unattainable — a 
fact  which  should  make  us  careful  not  to  boast  too 
loudly  of  the  times  in  which  wc  live,  nor  to  be  too  ready 
to  disparage  what  preceding  generations  have  done. 


IV 

THE  LESSON  OF  THE   FALL  OF  THE   ROMAN   EMPIRE 

J  ^ IIISTOIRE  est  U7i  recommcjicemejit  perpetuel''  a 
French  writer  has  said.  If  the  forms  in  which 
history  manifests  itself  are  infinitely  various,  the  forces 
w^hich  inspire  it  are  always  the  same,  and  are  every- 
where at  work,  on  a  large  scale  or  on  a  small,  openly  or 
secretly.  It  is,  therefore,  not  to  be  wondered  at  that 
the  decadence  of  the  Roman  Empire  is  being  repeated 
in  our  time  in  the  modern  w'orld. 

This  assertion  may  seem  paradoxical  and  strange. 
What!  are  we  moaerns  on  the  downward  grade?  Why, 
one  hears  of  nothing  but  progress  on  every  side.  Never 
was  there  an  epoch  more  proud  of  its  loudly  vaunted 
achievements.  The  sciences  are  adding  discovery  to 
discovery.  The  wealth  of  the  world  is  increasing  with 
giddy  rapidity.  Comfort  and  culture  arc  spreading  in 
every  class  and  in  every  country.  One  after  another, 
the  most  recondite  treasures  of  the  earth  are  falling 
into  our  hands.  We  are  gradually  fighting  down  all  the 
forces  of  nature  which  for  so  long  a  time  kept  our 
ancestors  at  a  distance,  impeded  them,  even  tlireatened 

77 


78     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

them  with  death,  from  the  law  of  gravity  to  the  most 
insidious  maladies.  Is  it  permissible  to  talk  of  de- 
cadence at  the  very  mom.ent  when  man  has  made 
himself  lord  of  the  whole  earth,  and  is  even  learning  to 
fly?  History  cannot  show  a  richer,  wiser,  more  power- 
ful, more  daring  epoch  than  the  present  one.  No  wonder 
that  most  people  would  resent  the  suggestion  that  we, 
in  the  flush  of  our  brilliant  successes,  are  seeing  the 
repetition  of  that  ancient  and  terrible  history  of  the 
last  centuries  of  the  Roman  Empire,  which  was  one  of 
the  saddest  and  deadliest  episodes  in  the  world's  history. 

And  yet  that  history  is  repeating  itself,  to  a  certain 
extent  at  any  rate.  The  showy  wealth  and  the  noisy 
triumphs  of  modern  civilisation  veil,  but  do  not  hide, 
this  recommencement  de  Vhistoire  from  him  who  studies, 
in  a  spirit  of  philosophy,  our  times  and  the  decadence 
of  the  Roman  Empire.  It  is  true  that  there  are  immense 
differences  between  the  two  civilisations  and  the  two 
epochs.  But  notwithstanding  these  differences,  what 
wonderful  resemblances  there  are!  Consider  especially 
that  disease  which  corrupted  the  trunk  of  the  Roman 
Empire,  and  which  is  beginning  slowly,  subtly,  in- 
sidiously to  eat  the  heart  out  of  the  modern  world. 

The  disease  which  killed  the  Roman  Empire  was,  in 
fact,  excessive  urbanisation.  Neither  the  attacks  of 
barbarism  from  outside,  nor  those  of  Christianity  from 
within,  would  have  prevailed  against  its  might  and  its 
massive  weight,  if  the  strength  of  the  colossus  had  not 
been  already  undermined  by  this  internal  cancer.    But, 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         79 

slowly  and  steadily,  the  disease  had  spread  through  the 
trunk  of  the  Empire,  and  had  attacked  its  most  vital 
organs  one  after  the  other,  fostered  on  its  deadly  errand 
by  wealth,  peace,  art,  literature,  culture,  religion,  all 
the  blessings  which  men  most  long  for  and  most  prize. 
In  order  to  understand  this  extraordinary  phe- 
nomenon of  Roman  history,  we  must  hark  back  to  the 
generations  that  lived  quietly  and  in  a  relatively  happy 
state  in  the  flowery  times  of  Rome's  real  power  and 
greatness.  After  two  centuries  of  war,  at  the  beginning 
of  the  Christian  era,  peace  was  finally  established  in  the 
great  Empire  which  Rome  had  conquered.  In  the  days 
of  peace,  the  barbarian  West  learned  from  the  Romans 
how  to  cultivate  the  earth,  to  cut  the  forests,  to  ex- 
cavate the  minerals,  to  navigate  the  rivers,  to  speak  and 
to  write  Latin.  It  became  civilised,  and  bought  the 
manufactures  of  the  ancient  industrial  cities  of  the 
East.  Every  fresh  market  of  the  West,  as  it  was 
opened  up,  gave  a  stimulus  to  the  ancient  industries  of 
the  East,  which  found  in  such  market  a  new  clientele. 
Contact  with  the  barbarism  of  the  West  rapidly  gave 
fresh  youth  to  the  old  civilisation  of  the  East, — Egypt, 
Syria,  Asia  Minor, — which  had  decayed  somewhat  in 
the  great  crisis  of  the  last  century  of  the  republic. 
Ever}^where  fresh  lands  were  brought  under  cultiva- 
tion, methods  of  agriculture  were  perfected,  minerals 
were  searched  for,  new  industries  and  new  branches  of 
commerce  were  opened  up.  Prosperity  and  luxury 
increased  in  every  nation,   even  the  most  barbarous, 


8o     Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  in  every  class,  even  the  poorest,  which  acquired  a 
taste  for  the  luxuries  of  civilisation. 

An  epoch  of  rapid  increase  of  wealth,  of  lucky  enter- 
prises, of  frequent,  close,  and  varied  commercial  and 
intellectual  intercourse  between  the  most  distant 
peoples,  began.  In  every  part  of  the  Empire,  in  Gaul 
as  well  as  in  Asia  Minor,  in  Spain  as  well  as  in  Africa, 
these  new  trades,  these  new  industries  and  agricultural 
enterprises  gave  rise  to  a  prosperous  middle  class  and 
to  provincial  aristocracies, — nouveaux  riches  families, — 
which  gradually  came  to  form  the  governing  class  of  the 
Empire,  migrated  to  the  cities,  strove  to  enlarge  them, 
to  embellish  them,  and  to  make  them  more  comfortable, 
reproducing  in  every  part  of  the  Empire  the  splendours 
of  the  lu-ban  civilisation  after  the  Greco- Asiatic  model 
as  perfected  by  the  practical  Roman  spirit  of  organisa- 
tion. In  every  province,  the  example  of  the  Emperor 
in  Rome  found  imitators.  In  the  first  and  second  cen- 
turies, every  rich  family  spent  part  of  its  possessions  on 
the  embellishment  of  the  cities,  and  made  provision  for 
the  common  people  of  profits,  comforts,  and  pleasures: 
they  built  palaces,  villas,  theatres,  temples,  baths,  and 
aqueducts.  They  distributed  grain,  oil,  amusements, 
and  money.  They  endowed  public  services  and  as- 
sumed the  role  of  pious  founders. 

The  Empire  covered  itself  with  cities  great  and  small, 
rivalling  each  other  in  splendour  and  wealth;  and  into 
these  cities,  at  the  expense  of  (lc])opulating  the  country- 
side where  nobody  was  willing  any  longer  to  live,  it 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         8i 

attracted  the  peasantry,  the  village  artisans,  and  the 
yeomanry.  In  these  cities,  schools  were  opened  in 
which  the  youth  of  the  middle  class  were  taught 
eloquence,  literature,  and  philosophy,  and  trained  for 
official  posts,  the  number  of  which  increased  from  gen- 
eration to  generation,  and  for  the  liberal  professions. 
Thus,  in  the  second  century  A.D.,  the  Empire  spread,  in 
the  sun  of  the  pax  Romana,  which  illumined  the  world, 
its  countless  marble-decked  cities,  as  our  time  spreads, 
in  the  sun  of  modern  civilisation,  the  confused  and 
smoky  opulence  of  its  cities,  large  and  moderate-sized, 
crowded,  disordered,  a  blaze  of  light  by  night,  bristling 
with  chimneys  and  shrouded  in  black  fog  by  day.  In 
other  words,  the  most  important  phenomenon  in  the 
whole  history  of  the  Roman  Empire,  during  the  first 
two  centuries  of  the  Christian  era,  is,  as  in  the  nine- 
teenth century,  the  rapid  growth  and  enrichment  of  the 
cities. 

The  phenomenon  was  not  then  so  rapid  nor  on  so 
large  a  scale  as  it  is  to-day;  not  a  single  city  in  the 
Empire,  not  even  Rome,  ever  attained,  in  my  opinion, 
a  population  of  one  million  inhabitants.  The  cities 
which  seemed  big  in  those  days  Vv'ould  be  only  of 
moderate  size  now.  Populations  and  riches  were 
smaller.     But  the  phenomenon  in  itself  was  the  same. 

From  the  third  century  onwards,  the  excessive  ur- 
banisation in  the  Roman  Empire,  which  had  been  the 
cause  of  the  splendour  and  apparent  wealth  of  the 
preceding  century,  began  to  change  into  a  dissolving 


82    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

force,  which  drove  that  brilHant  world  back  into  the 
chaos  from  which  urbanisation  had  evolved  it.  Little 
by  little,  the  expenditure  of  the  urban  civilisation,  the 
cities  and  their  increasing  luxury,  out-distanced  the 
fertility  of  the  countryside,  and,  from  that  moment, 
the  latter  began  to  be  depopulated  and  sterilised  by  the 
cities.  With  each  succeeding  generation,  the  impulse 
towards  the  cities  became  stronger.  The  numbers  and 
the  requirements  of  the  modern  population  increased. 
The  State  and  the  wealthy  classes  were  inundated  with 
requests,  prayers,  and  threats,  urging  them  to  satisfy 
these  requirements,  to  adorn  and  enrich  ever  more  and 
more  the  cities,  which  were  the  glory  and  splendour  of 
the  Empire. 

In  order  to  feed,  amuse,  and  clothe  crowded  city- 
populations;  to  carry  through  the  construction  of  the 
magnificent  monuments  whose  ruins  we  still  admire; 
to  provide  work  for  the  industries  and  arts  of  the  cities, 
— agriculture  was,  little  by  little,  ground  down  by  ever- 
increasing  burdens.  The  position  of  the  peasant,  in  the 
solitude  of  the  depopulated  countryside,  became  ever 
more  sad  and  gloomy,  just  as  the  cities  became  fairer, 
bigger,  fuller  of  amusement  and  festivals.  The  im- 
pulse towards  the  cities  increased,  and  one  day  the 
Empire  awoke  to  find  that  its  cities  were  swarming  with 
beggars,  idlers,  vagabonds,  masons,  plasterers,  sculp- 
tors, painters,  dancers,  actors,  singers — in  short,  the 
whole  tribe  of  the  artisans  of  pleasure  and  of  luxury. 
But  in  the  fields,  which  were  expected  to  feed  all  these 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         83 

men  who  had  crowded  into  the  cities  to  work  or  to  idle, 
there  was  a  dearth  of  peasants  to  cultivate  the  land. 
Also,  with  the  disappearance  of  the  rural  population, 
the  problem  of  recruiting  the  army,  which  drew  its 
soldiers  then,  as  always,  from  the  country,  became 
increasingly  serious.  While  the  cities  tricked  them- 
selves out  with  magnificent  monuments,  the  Empire 
was  threatened  with  a  dearth  of  bread  and  of  soldiers. 

It  must  be  owned  that  the  Empire  struggled  against 
this  menace  with  desperate  vigour.  It  introduced  the 
villeinage  of  the  soil.  It  tried  to  bind  the  peasants  to 
the  land.  It  established  heredity  of  trade  or  calling. 
But  the  efTort  was  fruitless.  Aggravated  by  one  of  the 
most  tremendous  intellectual  blunders  in  the  annals  of 
history,  the  crisis  became  insoluble.  The  agriculture 
of  the  Empire,  and  with  it  the  Empire  itself,  received 
its  death-blow.  The  East  and  the  West  split  apart,  and, 
left  to  itself,  the  West  went  to  jncces.  The  greatest 
of  the  works  of  Rome,  the  Enijiirc  founded  by  her  in 
Europe,  including  the  immense  territory  bounded  by 
the  Rhine  and  the  Danube,  kiy  a  vast  ruin:  a  ruin  of 
shattered  monuments,  of  peo])les  rclrnpsed  into  bar- 
barism, of  perished  arts,  of  forgotten  tongues,  of  laws 
thrown  to  the  four  \:''n<h',  of  roads,  villages,  cities 
razed  from  the  face  of  the  earth,  swallowed  up  in  the 
primeval  forest  which  slowly  and  tenaciously  thrust 
out  its  tentacles,  in  that  cemetery  of  a  ])ast  civilisation, 
and  entwined  the  giant  bones  of  Rome ! 

But  the  reader  will  say:  "  But  that  is  not  happening, 


84    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  never  will  happen,  to  contemporary  civilisation. 
Even  if  it  cannot  be  denied  that  there  is  a  certain 
analogy  between  the  history  of  the  first  two  centuries 
of  the  Empire  and  that  of  modern  times,  the  analogy 
stops  short  at  this  point.  The  world  will  never  witness 
another  catastrophe  like  that  of  the  Roman  Empire; 
or  at  any  rate,  nobody  now  alive  will  witness  it." 

I  heartily  concur  in  this  opinion.  Modern  civilisa- 
tion will  resist  the  ills  which  assail  it  better  than 
ancient  civilisation  resisted  them.  But  it  will  be  able 
to  do  so  because  it  is  stronger,  not  because  it  does  not 
contain  within  itself  the  germ  of  the  cancer  which 
destroyed  the  Roman  world.  Many  symptoms  prove 
this.  I  will  dilate  upon  one  of  them  only,  the  most 
serious,  the  most  salient,  the  most  generally  recognised 
and  felt,  even  though  few  up  to  the  present  have  seen 
in  it  an  analogy  and  a  resemblance  to  the  great  his- 
torical crisis  of  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire.  I  refer 
to  the  rise  in  the  cost  of  living. 

To-day,  Europe  and  America  resound  from  one  end 
to  another  with  a  chorus  of  complaints  from  men  and 
women  who  have  to  live  in  the  cities.  Rent,  bread, 
milk,  meat,  vegetables,  eggs,  clothes — everything,  in 
short,  is  rising  in  price.  Even  people  in  the  thirties 
can  remember  having  witnessed  times  of  fable,  a  kind 
of  mythical  golden  age,  in  which  things  were  worth 
practically  nothing  compared  with  their  price  to-day. 
Governments  are  besieged  with  entreaties,  threats,  and 
prayers  to  provide  supplies,  but  they  do  not  know  how 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         85 

to  do  so.  What  is  the  cause,  what  the  remedy,  of  this 
strange  phenomenon?  Some  lay  the  blame  on  the 
taxes;  some  on  Protection;  some  on  the  merchants  and 
speculators. 

And  indeed,  at  first  sight,  the  phenomenon  seems 
inexplicable.  At  no  period  of  history  was  there  such 
a  determined  rush  to  make  money  as  at  the  present 
time.  No  age  had  at  its  disposal  so  many  and  such 
effective  means  of  making  it.  The  men  of  to-day  are 
obsessed  to  such  an  extent  by  the  frenzy  for  work  that 
they  no  longer  have  time  to  live.  Statistics  tell  us  in 
exact  figures  the  yearly  increase  in  the  production  of 
the  world.  So  the  earth  ought  to  be  wallowing  in 
abundance,  an  abundance  such  as  the  world  has  never 
seen  heretofore.  How  comes  it,  then,  that  men  every- 
where complain,  and  most  loudly  in  the  richest  coun- 
tries, of  the  intolerable  dearness  of  everything?  What 
is  the  object,  what  the  effect,  of  the  work  of  the  man  of 
to-day,  if  not  abundance  but  scarcity  is  the  recompense 
of  daily  toil? 

This  scarcity  is  a  graver  and  more  complex  phe- 
nomenon than  those  who  most  comj^lain  of  it  suppose, 
and  is  not  the  fault  of  government  or  traders.  It  is  a 
veritable  rccomnic)ice7nent  de  rhistoirc,  and  the  study 
of  the  Roman  Empire  can  be  of  the  greatest  service  in 
helping  us  to  understand  it.  It  is  the  first  serious, 
universally  felt  symptom  of  that  excessive  urbanisation 
which  was  the  ruin  of  ancient  Rome.  This  modem 
society  arises  from  the  over-development  of  the  cities, 


S6    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

from  the  too  rapid  increase  in  the  needs  and  luxuries 
of  the  multitudes  who  live  in  the  cities.  Men  and 
money  concentrate  in  the  cities,  and  swell  the  urban 
industries  and  luxury,  public  and  private,  intent  on 
putting  into  operation  all  the  marvels  which  the  fertile 
modern  genius,  inspired  by  competition  in  the  race  for 
progress,  is  continually  inventing.  The  countryside, 
on  the  other  hand,  has  in  the  last  half-century  been 
left  too  much  to  itself,  and  agriculture  has  been  too 
much  neglected,  exactly  as  began  to  be  the  case  in  the 
Roman  Empire  at  the  beginning  of  the  second  century 
of  the  Christian  era.  It  is  easy  to  guess  what  must  be 
the  natural  consequence  of  this  lop-sided  arrangement. 
The  cities  grow  bigger;  industries  increase  in  number 
and  in  size;  the  luxury  and  the  needs  of  the  masses, 
crowded  together  in  the  cities,  augment.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  is  no  proportionate  increase  in  the  pro- 
ductiveness of  the  land.  And  so  the  increase  in  wealth 
is  accompanied  by  an  increasing  scarcity  of  the  fruits 
of  the  earth;  and  the  things  which  serve  to  clothe  and 
feed  us — cotton,  linen,  hemp,  wool,  cereals,  meat, 
vegetables — nearly  all  rise  in  price  much  more  than 
do  manufactured  goods.  This  explains  the  scarcity 
that  vexes  the  cities  in  proportion  to  their  growth  in 
size. 

In  no  country  is  this  phenomenon  more  apparent  and 
interesting  than  in  the  United  States.  Which  of  the 
nations  of  the  world  could  more  easily  revel  in  the  most 
marvellous  abundance  of  everything  which  it  is  possible 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         87 

to  conceive?  The  United  States  has  no  lack  of  terri- 
tories to  cultivate;  or  of  capital,  which  accumulates 
every  year  in  immeasurable  quantity ;  or  of  strong 
arms,  Europe  providing  her  with  immigrants  in  the 
prime  of  life;  or  of  the  spirit  of  enterprise  and  of 
untiring  energy.  And  yet,  in  no  country  of  Europe  are 
complaints  of  the  expense  of  living  more  generally  and 
loudly  raised  than  in  the  United  States.  Why?  Be- 
cause in  America  the  disproportion  between  the  pro- 
gress of  the  country  and  that  of  the  cities,  between 
industrial  progress  and  agricultural  progress,  is  even 
greater  than  in  Europe,  the  home  of  populations  which 
for  centuries  have  been  accustomed  to  a  country  life. 
Consequently  the  scarcity  is  greater  and  more  vexatious 
in  the  United  States,  because  the  wealth  of  that  coun- 
try is  greater  than  that  of  Europe. 

Someone  will  say:  "However  that  may  be,  if  this 
scarcity  which  we  arc  experiencing  is  the  most  obvious 
symptom  of  the  excessive  urbanisation  from  which  our 
civilisation  is  suffering,  the  suffering  cannot  be  a  very 
serious  matter;  it  must  be  far  from  assuming  the  grave 
and  dangerous  aspect  which  it  bore  in  the  time  of  the 
Roman  Empire.  So  in  this  respect  also  we  can  consider 
ourselves  lucky;  this  excessive  urbanisation  does  not 
cause  us  more  than  a  certain  material  uneasiness, 
which  is  felt  by  the  middle  and  lower  classes  in  the 
cities.  In  the  Roman  Empire,  on  the  other  hand, 
it  produced  a  historical  catastrophe."  All  that  is  true, 
without  a  doubt,  but  precisely  on  this  account  ought 


88    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  lesson,  with  which  the  history  of  the  fall  of  the 
Roman  Empire  is  pregnant,  to  be  read  and  pondered. 

In  the  Roman  Empire,  too,  for  a  long  time,  just  as 
now  in  Europe  and  America,  this  excessive  urbanisation 
only  occasioned  a  by-no-means  intolerable  material 
uneasiness  to  the  most  numerous  and  poorest  classes  of 
town-dweller.  In  the  first  and  second  centuries, — that 
is  to  say,  in  the  two  most  prosperous  and  splendid  cen- 
turies of  the  Empire, — numerous  inscriptions  remind  us 
of  gifts  made  by  rich  citizens  or  precautions  taken  by 
the  cities  to  meet  the  scarcity  of  victuals  which  pressed 
hard  upon  the  poorer  classes.  It  is  scarcely  necessary 
to  mention  Rome  in  this  connection,  so  notorious  is  the 
fact.  From  the  day  when  it  became  the  metropolis  of  a 
vast  Empire,  the  scarcity  of  victuals  became  a  perma- 
nent feature  of  the  city;  and  the  State  had  to  furnish 
the  city  with  the  famous  Jriimentationes,  which  were, 
in  the  last  two  centuries  of  the  Republic  and  throughout 
the  Empire,  one  of  Rome's  most  serious  preoccupations. 
Mistress  of  a  mighty  Empire,  Rome  was  for  centuries 
sure  of  being  obeyed  in  the  most  distant  provinces  by 
the  people  that  her  sword  had  conquered;  but  there 
was  never  a  day  in  the  year  when  she  was  sure  of 
keeping  the  wolf  from  the  door! 

In  the  Roman  Empire  also,  then,  for  a  long  time  the 
excessive  urbanisation  made  itself  felt  in  the  shape  of  a 
troublesome,  but  by  no  means  intolerable,  rise  in  the 
cost  of  living  in  the  cities.  Why  did  it  gradually  bring 
about  a  terrific  social  dissolution?    Because  the  Roman 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire         89 

Empire,  instead  of  leaving  its  cities  to  fight  down  this 
evil,  tried  to  abolish  it  by  artificial  means;  and  those 
artificial  means  it  ap]:)lied  ever  more  and  more  exten- 
sively, the  more  serious  the  evil  became.  The  crisis  of 
the  cities  of  the  Empire  began  in  the  third  century, 
which  saw  the  depopulation  of  the  countryside,  and  the 
diminution  of  agricultural  production,  while  in  the 
cities,  on  the  other  hand,  victuals  were  rising  in  price, 
and  the  number  of  beggars  was  increasing  in  a  most 
alarming  way.  If  the  State  had  allowed  this  crisis  to 
run  its  natural  course,  what  would  have  happened? 
Of  course  things  would  of  themselves  have  regained 
their  equilibrium  little  by  little.  Part  of  the  urban 
proletariat,  unable  to  live  in  the  overcrowded  cities, 
and  seeing  themselves  condemned  to  a  sort  of  chronic 
famine  and  gradual  extinction,  would  have  returned 
to  work  in  the  fields.  When  the  drain  on  the  popula- 
tion of  the  countryside  becomes  too  great,  the  evil 
admits  of  only  one  remedy :  and  that  is.  that  life  in  the 
cities  should  be  allowed  to  become  unbearable  to  a 
certain  number  of  the  citizens,  so  that  they  may  be 
tempted  to  exchange  it  for  life  and  work  in  the  fields. 

But  the  Roman  State  could  not  bring  itself  to  let  the 
evil  follow  its  natural  course.  The  large  cities,  be- 
ginning with  Rome,  had  too  great  infiuence  with  the 
Government;  and  throughout  the  Empire  the  city 
beautiful  and  rich  had  come  to  represent  the  model  of 
civilisation.  Little  by  little,  the  State  let  itself  be  per- 
vSuaded  to  do  for  each  of  its  cities  what  it  had  done  for 


90    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Rome  ever  since  its  earliest  conception  of  a  world- 
policy,  under  the  delusion  that  it  could  thus  stave  off 
the  impending  crisis.  With  a  view  to  easing  the  misery 
of  the  urban  proletariat,  it  took  public  works  in  hand 
in  every  direction,  regardless  of  their  utility.  It  dis- 
tributed victuals  free  or  at  half-price.  It  multiplied 
philanthropic  institutions  and  encouraged  the  wealthy 
families  to  imitate  and  to  assist  it.  But  all  these 
schemes  cost  money,  which  the  State  could  secure  only 
by  increasing  the  taxes  on  agriculture,  while  the 
wealthy  families  had  to  spend  in  the  cities  the  bulk  of 
the  wealth  which  they  derived  from  their  country 
property.  The  result  was  that  life  was  artificially  made 
easier  and  more  comfortable  in  the  cities,  and  harder 
and  more  difficult  in  the  country,  whereas  the  natural 
trend  of  circumstances  would  have  produced  the  oppo- 
site effect.  The  evil,  treated  in  so  ridiculous  a  way, 
became  worse.  The  exodus  of  the  peasants  into  the 
cities  increased,  and  brought  a  corresponding  increase 
in  the  demands  on  the  public  purse  for  the  amelioration 
ot  the  conditions  of  city  life.  The  intensification  of  the 
evil  was  met  by  an  increase  in  the  dose  of  the  very 
remedy  which  aggravated  it — useless  expenditure  in 
the  cities,  ruinous  taxes  on  agriculture.  Matters  went 
from  worse  to  worse,  until  the  system  reached  the 
limit  of  its  elasticity,  and  the  whole  social  fabric  col- 
lapsed in  a  colossal  catastrophe. 

This  is  precisely  the  mistake  which  modern  civilisa- 
tion  must   learn    to   avoid.      The   catastrophe   of   the 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Mmpire         91 

Roman  Ernj;iro  V:r:/:h':'^  u:;  rnod^jrn:;  ono  Ies:-ion :  and 
that,  is,  that  the  ''r/il  from  v/hi^h  t/io  ;^reat  cities  of  the 
civil  v/orld  are  :.ufferin;^  at  pre  .ent  i  .  a  :.a]utar>%  health- 
givin;^,  and  benefieent  visitation.  For  it  puts  a  natural 
brake  on  the  ^.^ro'.vth  of  eities  and  of  their  luxur}',  and 
keeps  thf:  population  in  the  fields,  v/here  t?ie  rise  in 
the  price  of  livin;^  hrin^j;s  profit,  ;.Teater  con'ifort,  and 
improved  livin;.;;  in  its  train.  It  is,  in  short,  the  vis 
mcdicatrix  nalurct,  v/hich  tends  to  restore  the  ?jalance 
betv/een  a;-;riculture  and  industry,  ?y^tv.-een  the  city 
and  the  countr}',  a  balance  v.-hich  the  development 
of  modern  ci-silisation  has  ujjset.  Therefore  all  the 
artificial  measures  v/hich  pretend  to  mitigate  this  evil, 
at  the  very  moment  v/hen  the  force  of  circumstances 
demands  that  this  development  shall  stop,  m.ust  be 
pernicious.  While  they  tide  over  a  trifiing  evil  of 
the  momen*,  they  lay  up  for  the  future  troubles  and 
difficulties  and  dang'ers  of  infinitel}'  ^.^jeater  gravity. 

Even  if  modern  ci'.'ili-:ation  adojjted  in  its  en'irety 
the  policy  pursued  by  the  Roman  Empire,  and  tried  to 
eradicate  the  evil  v.-i*h  the  same  deadly  artificial  miCa- 
sures  v.'hich  only  aggravated  it,  thc-re  vould  still  doubt- 
less be  no  ground  for  fc-aring  a  cata  :*rophe  in  the  future 
analogous  to  that  v.-hich  overv.scelr.ced  Greco-Rom^n 
civilisation.  Modern  civilisation  i..  too  vast,  too  pov/er- 
ful,  too  dec-p-rooted,  so  h'!.ve  any  fcs'.r  of  a  similar  fate. 
But  if  not  destroyed,  mod'-;rn  c:v;":^ation  might  be 
Tjrof"oundly  shaken  ----.d  v. ;-,l:cncd  in  the  event  of  its 
imita'irig  thf-  jxdi-  ;,•  of  Rome  and  ;, coking  to  favour  the 


92    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

cities  overmuch  at  the  expense  of  the  country ; — all  the 
more  shaken  and  weakened,  because,  dazzled  as  we  all 
are  by  the  triumphs  of  the  world  in  which  we  live,  and 
by  the  surface  marks  of  its  powers  and  grandeur,  it  is 
much  more  difficult  for  us  than  it  was  for  the  ancients 
in  a  similar  case  to  discern  the  signs  of  old  age  in  it, 
and  the  cracks  which  are  spreading  in  the  edifice  in 
which  we  live. 

There  is  a  further  lesson  to  be  learned  by  us  moderns 
from  the  history  of  the  decadence  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire: and  that  is,  not  to  mistake  the  glamour  of  the 
external  manifestations  of  wealth  and  power  for  signs 
of  real  wealth  and  power.  A  civilisation  is  not  always 
in  reality  richer  and  stronger  in  times  when  it  bears 
the  most  visible  marks  of  so  being ;  we  are  rather  apt  to 
find  that,  when  it  is  most  dazzling  in  outward  seeming, 
its  decadence  has  already  begun.  We  often  halt  in 
stupefaction  and  admiration  before  the  great  ruins  of 
ancient  Rome,  especially  those  offered  by  the  European 
provinces  of  the  Empire.  We  think  how  great,  power- 
ful, and  rich  must  have  been  the  Empire  which  could 
rear  monuments  so  massive  that  all  the  centuries  have 
not  been  able  to  sweep  them  entirely  from  the  face  of 
the  earth.  And  yet,  if  we  are  to  look  at  these  relics  in 
their  right  light,  we  must  remember  that  practically 
all  the  great  Roman  monuments  whose  remains  survive 
to  our  day  on  a  large  scale,  belong  to  the  third,  fourth, 
and  fifth  centuries  of  the  Christian  era — to  the  centuries 
of  decadence  and  dissolution.    As  the  Empire  weakens 


The  ¥d\\  of  the  Roman  Empire         93 

and  ages,  its  monuments  become  more  and  more 
elaborate  and  colossal.  A  fairly  safe  rule  for  guessing 
the  century  to  which  Roman  monuments  belong  is  to 
assume  that  the  more  imposing  the  ruins,  the  later  is 
the  epoch  to  which  they  should  be  attributed. 

For  Rome  herself,  the  time  of  the  greatest  expansion, 
splendour,  and  population  was  the  middle  of  the  fourth 
century — that  is  to  say,  when  her  decadence  was  already 
far  advanced.  Not  till  then  did  Rome  become,  for  the 
number  and  size  of  her  temples,  the  magnificence  of 
her  baths,  her  basilicas,  and  her  private  palaces,  for  the 
beauty  of  her  public  gardens,  for  her  size  and  popula- 
tion, the  first  and  most  marvellous  city  of  the  Empire: 
the  portent  which  evokes  the  admiration  of  the  whole 
world.  How  much  smaller,  on  the  other  hand,  how 
much  more  simple  and  modest  was  she  in  the  first 
century,  a  time  when  the  Empire  really  was  at  its  most 
flourishing  epoch,  with  its  frontiers  safe,  its  population 
on  the  up-grade,  its  cities  developing  themselves  by  a 
process  of  growth  which  was  still  a  perfectly  natural 
one,  agriculture,  trade,  and  industries  in  a  sound  con- 
dition, and  the  State  well  organised  and  strong. 

Nor  is  this  a  historical  paradox.  It  is  only  v/hat 
always  happens  to  a  greater  or  less  extent.  In  families 
as  in  nations  and  civilisations,  ostentation,  display,  the 
doing  on  a  grand  scale  everything,  even  what  might  be 
done  on  a  small  scale  without  detriment,  or  even 
advantageously,  are  a  sign  of  decadence  rather  than  of 
progress.    The  passion  for  the  colossal  and  the  enormous 


94    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

is  not  a  healthy  passion,  nor  does  it  flourish  in  epochs 
of  strength  and  sound  moral  and  social  equilibrium;  it 
is  a  passion  which  thrives  in  epochs  of  decadence,  epochs 
convulsed  by  a  deep-seated  disproportion  between  de- 
sires and  reality,  a  thirst  for  excitements  and  violent 
sensations,  lavish  in  the  expenditure  of  labour  and  of 
wealth  to  procure  a  fallacious  illusion  of  grandeur  and 
power,  spurred  on  by  a  spirit  of  rivalry  and  of  competi- 
tion which  easily  degenerates  into  false  pride. 

Not  the  least  of  the  causes  contributing  to  the  main- 
tenance and  increase  in  the  ancient  cities  of  that  sump- 
tuousness  of  festivals,  ceremonies,  and  monuments  which 
gradually  ruined  the  Roman  Empire  was  the  rivalry 
between  the  big,  the  medium-sized,  and  the  small  cities 
of  the  Empire,  between  provinces  and  districts,  between 
classes,  families,  professions,  sects,  and  religions.  When 
a  city  built  a  theatre,  or  baths,  or  a  basilica,  at  once  her 
sister-cities  wanted  one  too,  as  big  or  bigger.  If  a  rich 
family  built  or  endowed  a  temple  or  baths,  the  other 
families  wished  to  do  the  same  or  more.  There  was  a 
continual  competition  between  the  religions  to  have  the 
finest  temple  or  the  most  sumptuous  ceremonial.  That 
explains  why  a  little  city  like  Verona,  for  instance, 
has  an  enormous  amphitheatre,  in  which  the  whole 
population  of  the  city  could  be  accommodated  several 
times  over.  That  explains  why  the  provinces,  the  cities, 
and  private  individuals,  in  this  competition  of  display 
and  magnificence,  all  showered  enormous  wealth  on 
that   display,   wealth   which   would  have  been  better 


The  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire        95 

spent  in  defending  the  Empire  or  in  preserving  its 
economic  resources.  Many  of  those  remains  which 
evoke  our  admiration  to-day  meant,  in  the  days  when 
they  reared  their  proud  bulk  to  the  sky,  the  ruin  of  the 
Empire! 

And  now  let  us  search  our  own  consciences.  Can  we 
honestly  declare  that  our  epoch  is  untainted  by  this 
mania  for  grandeur  and  display,  this  spirit  of  sterile 
public  and  private  rivalry,  which  caused  the  ancient 
Roman  Empire  to  squander  such  vast  treasures,  and 
cloaked  its  fatal  decadence  with  a  vesture  of  splendour? 
I  cannot  suppose  that  our  freedom  from  such  taint 
would  be  maintained  by  anyone  who  remarked  the 
headlong  growth  of  public  and  private  luxury,  the  ever 
swelling  vanity  of  nations,  professions,  and  classes,  the 
tendency  to  mistake  in  everything  the  grandeur  of 
colossal  proportions  for  the  grandeur  of  intrinsic  virtue. 
Whoever  casts  his  eyes  around  him,  in  America  as  well 
as  in  Europe,  sees  this  impression  gaining  ground  on  all 
sides  and  acquiring  force.  It  fouls  the  stream  of 
politics,  religion,  literature,  philosophy,  and  art.  It 
corrupts  or  transforms  the  spirit  of  the  upper  as  well 
as  of  the  lower  classes.  Not  only  that,  but  there  is 
a  prevailing  tendency  to  consider  this  impression  a 
sign  of  force,  a  proof  of  greatness  and  of  progress.  The 
history  of  Rome  admonishes  us,  then,  to  distrust  this 
illusion,  and  to  sound  the  spirit  of  our  civilisation  to  its 
deepest  depths — that  spirit  which  to  us  seems  a  limpid 
mirror  of  perfection,  while  it  is  really  very  much  the 


^6    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

opposite.  If,  after  twenty  centuries  of  work  and  study, 
we  find  ourselves,  fortunate  heirs  of  an  ancient  civilisa- 
tion, in  a  position  to  live  more  safely  and  more  com- 
fortably than  did  our  ancestors  on  this  little  globe,  we 
are  not,  therefore,  justified  in  altering  the  moral  values 
and  virtues  to  suit  our  pleasures.  The  vices,  the  faults, 
the  depraved  inclinations  of  twenty  centuries  ago  re- 
main the  same  to-day  and  modern  civilisation  would  be 
guilty  of  the  gravest  of  errors  if,  deaf  to  the  great  lesson 
preached  by  the  ruins  of  Rome,  she  boasted  of  those 
very  defects  which  destroyed  in  the  ancient  world  one 
of  the  greatest  works  of  human  brain  and  energy  that 
history  has  to  offer. 


UPS   AND   DOWNS 

WE  are  always  talking  about  progress.  But  does 
"progress"  mean  only  the  multiplication  of 
wealth  and  of  the  power  and  speed  of  machines,  in 
other  words,  of  our  mastery  over  nature?  This  would  be 
a  rash  assertion.  "Progress"  implies  further  improve- 
ment of,  and  increase  in,  the  virtues,  and  the  diminution 
of  the  vices  inherent  in  human  nature.  Now,  can  any- 
one who  knows  the  history  of  ancient  civilisation,  the 
life,  the  customs,  the  ideas,  and  the  moral  outlook  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans,  say  that  we  have  become  better 
than  they?  And  if  he  can  say  so,  how  much  better  have 
we  become?  Have  we  become  better  in  every  depart- 
ment of  life,  or  are  there  some  things  in  which  we  show 
a  falling-off? 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  we  are  braver  than  the 
ancients.  Our  control  of  fire  has  obliged  us  to  be  con- 
tinually making  calls  upon  our  bravery.  The  formida- 
ble machines  which  we  set  in  motion;  the  explosives 
which  we  use  so  largely ;  the  murderous  forces  of  nature, 
hke  electricity,  which  we  have  brought  into  subservience ; 

7  97 


98    Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  thousand  dangerous  exploits  on  the  sea,  in  the 
bowels  of  the  earth,  and  in  the  giddy  heights  of  the  air 
in  which  thousands,  nay  millions,  of  engineers  and 
workmen  daily  risk  their  lives,  have  steeled  our 
temperaments  to  quell  that  blind  and  instinctive  fear 
which  lies  deep  down  in  human  nature. 

War  is  the  supreme  test  of  this  increased  courage. 
War  has  become  rarer,  it  is  true,  than  it  was  in  the 
ancient  world;  but  how  much  more  terrible  and  awe- 
inspiring  has  it  become,  both  by  land  and  by  sea,  since 
fire  replaced  steel  as  the  principal  weapon!  The  only 
forms  of  fire  known  to  the  ancients  as  useful  in  war 
were  boiling  oil,  which  was  often  used  in  sieges,  and 
the  so-called  Greek  fire,  which  was  employed  in  naval 
battles — a  mysterious  compound,  into  which  one  sus- 
pects, petroleum  entered,  for  it  was  much  used  by  the 
nations  and  cities  of  the  Black  Sea.  But  both  of  these 
were  but  children's  toys  compared  with  the  guns, 
shrapnel,  and  torpedoes  of  modern  warfare.  We  are 
justified,  therefore,  in  asserting  that  the  men  who  took 
part  in  the  battles  of  Marathon,  Cann^,  and  Zama  did 
not  need  to  have  hearts  so  stout  or  courage  so  intrepid 
as  the  men  who  faced  each  other  in  the  great  battles  of 
the  Napoleonic  era,  in  the  American  Ci\il  War,  in  the 
battles  between  the  Russians  and  Japanese,  or  in  the 
recent  Balkan  War. 

But  if  we  arc  more  courageous,  we  are  at  the  same 
time  less  cruel,  a  fact  which  throws  our  superior  courage 
into  greater  relief.    One  of  the  characteristic  differences 


Ups  and  Downs  99 

between  contemporary  civilisation  and  those  which 
preceded  it,  up  to  the  French  Revulutlon,  is  the  total 
suppression  of  the  bloody  spectacles  which,  under  so 
many  aspects  and  forms,  were  one  of  the  most  sinister 
delights  of  our  ancestors.  AVe  find  the  greatest  difficulty 
in  understanding  how  so  highly  civilised  a  people  as  the 
Romans,  with  so  many  thoughts  and  feelings  in  com- 
mon with  ourselves,  could  have  been  roused  to  such  a 
pitch  of  intoxication  by  the  games  of  gladiators  and 
the  baiting  of  wild  beasts.  And  yet  the  popular  passion 
for  these  bloody  games  was  such  that  even  the  emperors, 
in  whom  they  inspired  feelings  of  horror  and  repulsion, 
like  Augustus,  were  compelled  to  attend  the  gory 
spectacles,  so  as  not  to  appear,  b}'  their  absence,  to 
rebuke  those  who  supported  them  and  to  run  counter 
to  the  absorbing  passion  of  the  masses  for  them. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  an  ancient  Roman  came  back 
to  the  world,  and  saw  an  American  stadium  packed  with 
people  from  top  to  bottom,  he  would  be  not  a  little 
puzzled  to  explain  what  could  have  induced  so  many 
thousands  of  persons  to  have  flocked  together  from  afar 
merely  to  watch  a  football  match, — to  collect  in  such 
crowds,  endure  such  a  long  journey,  and  such  discom- 
fort, just  to  get  a  distant  view  of  some  youths  kicking 
their  legs  in  the  air!  It  would  seem  to  them  a  truly 
insipid  and  tiresome  spectacle.  Their  tastes  ran  to  a 
gory  struggle,  reminiscent  of  war,  to  fights  between  men 
and  animals,  blood  in  bucketfuis. 

Christianity  initiated  that  education  of  men's  feel- 


loo  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

ings  which  has  made  us  gradually  turn  away  our  eyes 
in  horror  from  these  atrocious  diversions.  But  how 
slow  and  difficult  this  education  has  been !  It  can  safely 
be  said  not  to  have  reached  its  climax  until  after  the 
Revolution.  Only  the  nineteenth  century,  intent  on 
mitigating  and  humanising  the  penal  law  in  every 
direction,  has  finally  succeeded  in  abolishing  the  last 
of  these  cruel  spectacles,  capital  punishment.  Right 
up  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  condemned 
prisoners  were  executed  throughout  Europe  with  much 
pomp  and  in  the  full  light  of  day,  in  the  central  squares 
of  the  cities,  at  times  and  places  at  which  everybody 
could  attend,  as  if  at  a  public  festival.  Indeed,  execu- 
tions were  invariably  attended  by  an  immense  public, 
attracted  by  cruel  curiosity  to  see  a  man  going  to  his 
death.  By  diminishing  the  number  of  death  sentences, 
and  by  executing  culprits  in  prison  yards  in  the  presence 
of  a  handful  of  witnesses,  or,  as  is  still  done  in  France, 
in  public,  but  at  dawn,  with  the  public  kept  at  as  great 
a  distance  as  possible,  the  nineteenth  century  has  put 
the  crown  on  one  of  the  most  far-reaching  and  wonder- 
ful moral  transformations  of  the  human  mind,  a 
transformation  which  owes  its  birth  to  the  words  of 
Christ  uttered  twenty  centuries  ago,  and  has  given 
modern  civilisation  one  notable  reason  for  boasting 
itself  superior  to  the  ancient. 

But  if  we  are  more  courageous  and  more  humane,  we 
are,  on  the  other  hand,  in  no  way  more  sober  or  more 
temperate.    As  far  as  these  virtues  are  concerned,  the 


Ups  and  Downs  loi 

ancient  world  cuts  a  much  better  figure  in  history  than 
does  the  modern.  We  have  deteriorated.  The  modern 
world  eats  and  drinks  to  excess.  It  indulges  to  excess 
in  alcoholic  drinks  and  stimulants.  The  only  intoxicat- 
ing drinks  known  to  the  ancients  were  wine  and  beer, 
and  wine  they  always  drank  mixed  with  water.  They 
did  not  know  alcohol,  nor  consequently,  liqueurs,  now 
so  numerous  and  so  highly  appreciated;  they  did  not 
know  tea,  coffee,  or  tobacco.  We  can  assert  positively 
that  drunkenness  was  the  rarest  of  vices  in  the  ancient 
world,  while  frugality  was  the  commonest  of  virtues. 
We  need  not  take  too  seriously  those  orgies  of  the 
wealthy  to  which  ancient  writers — especially  Latin 
writers — so  often  allude,  or  the  banquets  at  which 
dishes  of  parrots'  tongues  were  served,  or  pearls  dis- 
solved in  vinegar  were  drunk.  These  stories  bear  a 
strong  family  likeness  to  the  legends  current  in  Europe 
about  "the  corrupt  state  of  American  society,"  and 
are  due  to  the  same  tendency.  They  are  the  exagger- 
ated and  violent  reaction  of  an  ancient  puritanism 
against  the  natural  advances  of  luxury  and  against  that 
kind  of  moral  slackening  which  always  accompanies 
the  increase  of  wealth.  Just  as  the  dispassionate  and 
unprejudiced  European,  when  he  examines  at  close- 
quarters  the  so-called  "corrupt  state  of  American 
society,"  readily  recognises  that  the  high-sounding 
expression  only  indicates  certain  defects  and  weak- 
nesses which  certainly  are  reprehensible,  but  which  are 
common  to  the  whole  of  modern  civilisation  and  not 


102  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

peculiar  to  America,  so  the  famous  Roman  orgies  and 
the  banquets,  which  have  made  so  much  stir,  would 
seem  to  us,  if  a  miracle  allowed  us  to  attend  them,  very 
modest  and  unassuming  affairs  compared  to  our 
ostentatious  displays. 

As  far,  then,  as  sobriety  and  temperance  are  con- 
cerned, we  cannot  confront  our  ancestors  with  too 
haughty  a  mien.  And  what  shall  we  say  about  the 
purity  of  our  customs?  That  is  a  much  more  difficult 
problem,  perhaps  an  absolutely  insoluble  one.  At 
least  I,  for  my  part,  do  not  feel  myself  competent  to 
solve  it.  To  judge  from  Greco-Latin  literature  and  art, 
one  would  say  that  in  the  ancient  world,  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  countries  and  certain  epochs,  such 
as  the  centuries  during  which  Rome  was  controlled  by 
a  puritan  aristocracy,  the  customs  of  both  men  and 
women  were  very  free  and  easy.  But  literature  and 
art  often  afford  untrustw^orthy  evidence  on  which  to 
base  a  judgment  as  to  the  customs  of  an  epoch.  For 
vice,  wrong,  and  crime,  though  thc}^  may  shock  the 
moral  sense,  are  more  interesting  subjects  for  art  than 
are  virtue  and  honesty.  In  short,  literature  and  art 
always  seek  to  describe  what  is  rare,  exceptional,  and 
dramatic.  Therefore,  if  we  wish  to  judge  the  moral 
state  of  an  epoch  from  its  literature  and  art,  we  must 
know  how  far  and  in  what  degree  the  faults  and  vices 
described  or  chosen  for  artistic  representation  are  com- 
mon, what  is  the  rule,  and  how  many  arc  the  exceptions. 
And  how  are  we  to  find  this  out?     Wc  shall  have  to 


Ups  and  Downs  103 

know  the  moral  state  of  the  epoch,  and  literature  will 
not  help  us  to  this  knowledge. 

Anybody  who  judged  Paris  from  the  novels  or  dramas 
which  deal  with  Parisian  life  would  be  forced  to  con- 
clude that  the  French  metropolis  spends  the  whole  of 
its  time  in  amorous  adventures.  But  anyone  who 
kyiows  Paris  is  aware,  what  is  after  all  an  a  priori  suppo- 
sition, that  love  occupies  in  its  life  a  very  much  less 
prominent  place  than  in  its  literature;  and  that  the 
writers  of  dramas  and  novels  go  to  love  for  their  sub- 
ject by  preference,  because  love  admits  of  more  attrac- 
tive treatment  than  do  struggles  for  money  or  the 
rivalries  of  political  ambitions  and  the  crosses  of  the 
intellectual  life.  For  the  rest,  when  we  wish  to  judge 
the  customs  of  an  epoch  or  of  a  people,  we  must  not 
forget  that  it  is  not  always  the  epochs  or  the  nations 
which  lament  most  loudly  the  depravity  of  customs 
that  are  the  most  corrupt.  Far  from  it!  Often  the 
epochs  which  bewail  their  own  vices  most  bitterly 
are  those  in  which  the  moral  conscience  is  still  lively 
and  robust  and,  therefore,  protests  against  the  evil. 
The  epochs  which  are  dumb,  and  seem  most  virtuous, 
ha\'e  often  reached  such  a  pitch  of  depravity,  that  they 
have  become  indifferent  to  the  evil. 

A  striking  instance  of  this  curious  phenomenon  is  to 
be  found  in  the  history  of  Rome.  Horril)lc  stories  are 
told  of  the  first  period  of  the  ]-^nii)irv,  ---extending  from 
Augustus  to  Xero, — during  which  thc^  family  of  the  Julio- 
Claudii  were  at  the  helm  of  the  State.     History  and 


104  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

literature  are  ftill  of  scandals,  and  of  laments  over  the 
depravity  of  the  times.  In  the  second  period,  on  tlie 
other  hand, — that  of  the  Flavii  and  Antonines, — 
the  scandals  and  protests  cease.  The  depravity  of  the 
preceding  century  seems  suddenly  to  have  mysteriously 
disappeared.  The  Roman  world  has,  by  a  kind  of 
miraculous  conversion,  in  a  few  years  turned  virtuous. 
In  fact,  not  a  few  historians  have  thought  that  this 
miracle  did  come  about,  and  have  credited  it  to  the 
virtuous  emperors  of  the  second  century.  After  so 
many  bad  emperors,  Rome  at  last  got  some  good  ones ; 
and  the  trick  was  done!  But  anybody  who  studies  the 
facts  with  a  little  patience  will  have  no  hesitation  in 
concluding  that  the  times  of  the  Antonines  were  at 
least  as  corrupt  as  those  of  the  Julio-Claudii ;  but  that, 
while  in  the  first  century  of  the  Christian  era  the  an- 
cient Puritan  spirit  of  Rome  was  still  alive  and  vigorous, 
and  therefore  protested  against  the  deterioration  of 
customs  with  such  energy  that  its  protests  have  reached 
even  to  our  ears,  in  the  epoch  of  the  Antonines,  on  the 
other  hand,  this  spirit  was  spent.  Consequently, 
everybody  resigned  himself  to  the  evil,  cither  despair- 
ing of  being  able  to  cure  it,  or  not  giving  it  a  thought. 
And  so,  of  the  two  epochs,  that  which  was  painted  in 
the  blacker  colours  was,  perhaps,  really  the  better. 

It  is  impossible,  then,  to  decide  whether  our  customs 
are  better  or  worse  than  those  of  the  ancients.  It  is 
certain,  on  the  other  hand,  that  we  arc  much  more 
human  than  they.    For  with  us,  a  sentiment,  which  with 


Ups  and  Downs  105 

the  ancients  was  very  weak,  if  not  non-existent,  is  lively 
and  profound,  the  sentiment  of  the  moral  equality  of 
every  individual.  The  ancients  simply  refused  to  recog- 
nise in  the  slave  and  in  the  free  man,  in  the  nobleman 
and  in  the  plebeian,  in  the  citizen  and  in  the  foreigner, 
human  creatures  made  of  the  same  clay  and  animated 
by  the  same  spirit,  whom  the  mj'sterious  accidents  of 
fortune  had  placed  in  different  situations,  and  all  of 
whom  had  certain  sacred  and  inviolable  rights  in  the 
supreme  domain  of  justice.  A  few  philosophers  dared 
just  to  hint  at  such  doctrines,  but  without  laying  too 
much  stress  upon  them.  And  theirs  were  voices  crying 
in  the  wilderness.  The  free  man,  the  patrician,  and  the 
citizen  felt  themselves  creatures  of  another  species  and 
of  a  higher  nature  than  slaves,  plebeians,  and  foreigners, 
towards  whom  the  former  group  might  have  capricious 
bursts  of  benevolence,  but  to  whom  they  never  regarded 
themselves  as  bound  by  any  obligation.  Hence  came 
that  asperity  which  appears  in  all  the  social  relations  of 
ancient  peoples, — in  their  laws,  their  customs,  their 
wars,  their  political  quarrels, — and  which  often  seems 
to  us  in  so  striking  a  contrast  with  the  lofty  and  noble 
culture  which  adorned  the  ancient  states. 

Augustus,  for  instance,  was  a  grave,  well-balanced, 
and  prudent  man,  who  avoided  all  extremes.  Yet  the 
ancient  writers  tell  us  to  his  credit  that  he  had  amongst 
his  numerous  freedmen  several  n^cn  of  the  loftiest 
intellect,  of  wide  knowledge,  and  of  transparent  honesty, 
who  had  rendered  him  great  scr\"ircs;  but  that,  thouijh 


io6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

he  held  them  in  great  honour,  he  never  invited  any  of 
them  to  his  table.  Such  an  act  of  familiarity  between 
freedmen  and  patricians  would  have  seemed  to  the 
ancients  derogatory,  and  so  they  praised  Augustus  for 
having  avoided  it.  To  us,  on  the  other  hand,  this  atti- 
tude of  reserve  on  the  part  of  the  great  Emperor  seems 
strange  and  incomprehensible,  as  it  would  seem  on  the 
part  of  a  great  and  wealthy  manufacturer  who  was 
ashamed  to  dine  with  the  heads  of  departments  of  his 
business. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  difference  between  rich  and 
poor  was  much  less  marked  in  the  ancient  world  than  it 
is  in  the  modern.  This  is,  perhaps,  the  most  striking 
and  important  of  the  lines  of  cleavage  between  the 
world  of  antiquity  and  that  of  to-day.  The  idea  of  the 
moral  equality  of  men,  who  are  all  sons  of  God,  which 
was  disseminated  by  Christianity;  the  idea  of  political 
and  social  equality,  which  was  promulgated  by  the 
French  Revolution,  have  in  modern  civilisation  cut  at 
the  roots  of  the  ancient  distinctions  of  class,  of  religion, 
and  even  to  a  certain  extent  of  nationality.  But  mod- 
ern society  is  organising  itself,  in  compensation,  into 
a  hierarchy  of  wealth.  Men  may  consider  themselves 
in  theory  all  equal  to  one  another;  but  each  tries  to 
associate  with  those  persons  who  have  approximately 
the  same  means  as  he,  because  it  is  they  who  are  able  to 
have  the  same  habits  as  he  has.  Precisely  because  the 
modern  world  is  so  rich  and  so  luxurious,  the  modes  of 
living  among  the  richest,  the  rich,  and  the  moderately 


Ups  and  Downs  107 

well-to-do  classes  show  striking  differences.  And  what 
is  true  of  the  modes  of  living  is  also  true  of  tastes  and 
inclinations.  Everybody  realises  nowadays  that  dif- 
ferences or  resemblances  in  habits,  tastes,  and  inclina- 
tions are  what  most  attract  and  repel  men  and  influence 
them  in  treating  each  other  as  equals  or  uncquals,  when 
custom  and  tradition  have  established  no  other  moral 
difference  between  them.  The  motor-car  is  as  powerful 
a  barrier  between  the  social  classes  of  to-day  as  was 
aristocratic  prejudice  before  the  Revolution. 

In  ancient  times,  on  the  other  hand,  precisely  because 
the  world  was  then  so  much  poorer  and  simpler,  the 
difference  in  the  mode  of  living  between  poor  and  rich 
was  much  smaller.  Both  lived  in  closer  contact,  treat- 
ing each  other  really  as  equals,  provided  always  that 
they  were  of  the  same  rank  socially  and  politically. 
Augustus,  who  could  not  have  freedmen,  however 
enlightened,  to  dinner,  invited  poor,  but  free-born, 
plebeians.  A  rich  Roman  would  never  ha\'e  entertained 
a  freedman  in  his  house  or  at  his  table,  or  treated  him  as 
an  equal,  even  if  the  latter  had  been  as  rich  as,  or  richer 
than,  himself.  On  the  other  hand,  he  welcomed  and 
treated  as  an  equal  a  citizen  free-born  like  himself, 
however  miserable  and  reduced  to  living  on  his  bounty. 

If,  therefore,  the  ancient  conception  of  the  social 
relations  was  less  humane  and  less  generous  than  ours, 
it  was  not  wanting  in  a  certain  moral  grandeur  that  is 
wanting  to  ours,  inasmuch  as  in  estimating  a  man,  it 
subordinated  his  wealth  to  ideal  qualities,  such  as  free 


io8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

birth,  or  good  birth,  or  citizenship.  So  it  maintained  in 
society  certain  moral  values  which  were  not  to  be 
bought  with  money.  The  poorest  of  Roman  citizens 
was  conscious  and  proud  of  possessing  something  of 
inestimable  value,  which  the  richest  and  most  opulent 
of  Roman  freedmen  could  not  acquire  for  all  his 
wealth;  and  this  sentiment  was  a  very  real  alleviation 
of,  and  compensation  for,  his  poverty.  Dare  we  assert 
that  in  this  respect  our  social  system  does  not  fall  short 
of  the  ancient  one?  Such  an  assertion  would  be,  in  my 
opinion,  a  very  bold  one.  The  gravest  weakness  in 
modern  society  consists  precisely  in  this  continual  in- 
crease of  the  power  of  money,  as  an  all-regulating  force 
and  universal  standard.  If  the  social  evolution  which 
we  are  witnessing  continues  on  the  path  on  which  it  has 
started,  in  a  short  time  there  will  be  nothing  in  life 
worth  having  which  is  not  purchasable  for  money;  and 
then  what  means  will  there  be  left  of  bridling  the  greed 
and  envy  of  the  poor? 

But  this  superiority  of  ancient  society  was  in  its 
turn  the  effect  of  a  different  conception  of  wealth,  of 
its  rights,  its  duties,  and  its  objects.  It  is  an  exaggera- 
tion to  credit  the  ancients  with  a  simplicity  and  a  con- 
tempt for  riches,  qualities  which  serve  as  a  strange 
contrast  with  the  greed  and  the  insatiable  thirst  for  gold 
which  possess  the  moderns.  In  ancient  times,  it  is 
true,  men  preached  moderation  in  desires  and  taught 
the  art  of  being  contented  with  but  little,  with  greater 
zeal  and  success  than  it  is  taught  in  modem  times. 


Ups  and  Downs  109 

Nevertheless,  the  men  of  those  days,  with  but  few  excep- 
tions, were  not  less  greedy  than  we,  and  not  less  apt  to 
consider  wealth  as  the  greatest  of  life's  blessings.  Those 
who  could,  accumulated  large  private  fortunes  with  the 
same  frenzy  and  the  same  insatiate  greed  that  inflame 
so  many  speculators  and  business  men  of  the  present 
day;  and  many  of  those  who  were  content  to  live  the 
simple  life  were  converts  to  this  noble  and  lofty  philo- 
sophy from  necessity  rather  than  from  conviction.  The 
wealth  of  the  ancient  world  was  infinitely  smaller  than 
that  of  the  modern  world.  Consequently  a  large  num- 
ber of  persons  had  to  be  content  to  live  the  simple  life. 
On  this  account  the  religions  and  the  philosophers 
invented  many  theories  and  doctrines  to  prove  that 
simplicity  and  parsimony  were  more  desirable  than 
opulence  and  luxury.  That  is  the  reason  for  the 
numberless  theories  regarding  austerity  that  antiquity 
invented. 

But  though  the  ancients  desired  riches  as  much  as  we 
do,  they  were  not  infatuated  by  the  desire  to  multiply 
them  to  the  same  extent  as  the  moderns.  In  this 
respect,  the  ancients  may  truly  be  said  to  have  been 
more  austere  and  disinterested  than  we.  And  the 
difference  between  their  thoughts  and  feelings  on  the 
subject  and  our  own  is  seen  most  strikingly  in  one 
fundamental  principle,  which  is,  as  it  were,  the  key- 
stone of  the  whole  fabric  of  ideas  and  sentiments  which 
concern  riches;  I  mean,  the  question  of  putting  money 
out  at  interest.     To  modern  society  it  seems  the  most 


no  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

natural  thing  in  the  world  that  money  should  earn 
interest.  Nowadays,  the  number  of  those  who  lend  or 
invest  capital  in  the  countless  ways  offered  by  modern 
finance  is  infinite.  Every  one  of  these  big  and  little 
capitalists,  who  possess  State  bonds,  shares  in  railways 
or  industrials,  or  bank  or  commercial  securities,  would 
be  thunderstruck  if  anyone  told  him  that  he  was  behav- 
ing in  an  unseemly  way.  Matters  have  reached  a 
point  at  which  the  distinction  between  investment  and 
usury  is  fading  from  our  minds.  And  yet  numberless 
generations,  and  not  a  few  of  the  most  brilliant  civiHsa- 
tions  in  history,  professed  the  idea  that  any  business  of 
that  sort  was  unbecoming.  The  ancients  as  a  rule,  with 
but  few  casual  exceptions,  judged  it  unfitting  for  a  man 
of  the  respectable  classes  to  earn  money  in  any  other 
way  than  either  from  land  and  houses — realty — or  from 
direct  participation  in  commerce  and  the  arts;  never 
from  money  lent  at  interest  to  others.  That  was 
usury;  and  was  considered  nearly  always,  with  but  few 
exceptions  of  time  and  place,  as  the  exercise  of  a  de- 
grading profession.  Wealthy  men,  with  large  sums  of 
money  at  their  disposal,  were  able,  and  were  expected,  to 
help  those  who  needed  money;  but  with  gratuitous, 
not  with  interest-bearing  loans.  The  letters  of  Cicero, 
for  instance,  are  full  of  references  to  these  gratuitous 
loans,  for  which  the  great  orator,  when  short  of  money, 
often  asked  his  friends.  When  he  was  in  funds,  he  lent 
to  those  who  were  in  need.  In  short,  the  lending  of 
money  without  interest  to  upright  and  honourable  per- 


Ups  and  Downs  in 

sons  was  considered  in  those  days  a  duty  of  the  rich. 

Of  course,  ideas  hke  these  about  money  and  interest 
were  bound  to  retard  the  development  of  the  ancient 
world  and  the  increase  of  wealth.  But  they  were  ideas 
which  kept  alive  in  men's  minds  a  certain  noble  dis- 
interestedness of  which  it  would  be  difficult  to  find 
traces  to-day,  and  which  makes  amends  for  many  of 
the  asperities  of  ancient  civilisation. 

Considering,  then,  the  separate  virtues  one  by  one, 
we  find  that  in  some  we  have  progressed,  in  others  we 
have  not.  Therefore,  in  certain  respects  we  are  better 
than  the  ancients,  in  others  we  are  worse.  Must  we 
conclude  that  the  good  and  the  evil  balance  each  other, 
and  that,  therefore,  there  has  been  no  real  moral  pro- 
gress from  the  ancient  world  to  the  modern?  That 
would  be,  in  my  opinion,  a  very  bold  assertion.  It  is, 
in  fact,  undenialjle  that  our  moral  life  is  richer  in  princi- 
ples than  that  of  the  ancients,  because  we  have  re- 
tained many  of  the  ancient  principles,  and  have  added 
to  them  the  moral  principles  which  were  invented  by  the 
civilisations  which  flourished  after  the  fall  of  the  Roman 
Emj)irc.  "We  appreciate  the  virtues  of  patriotism,  civic 
affection,  and  valour  in  war  which  were  proper  to  the 
ancient  cities.  To  them  we  add  the  sense  of  legality 
and  right,  the  need  for  precise  and  prompt  justice, 
which  were  invented  by  the  ancient  jurists  and  per- 
fected by  the  moderns.  We  add  charity,  mercy,  love 
of  our  neighbour,  horror  of  cruel  amusements,  virtues 
which  Christ  taught  us.     W^e  add  the  sentiment  of  the 


112  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

dignity  and  the  rights  of  man,  which  was  created  by  the 
philosophy  of  the  eighteenth  century  and  by  the  French 
Revolution.  We  add  certain  other  brand-new  senti- 
ments, the  creation  of  the  civilisation  of  machinery, 
which  are,  therefore,  stronger  in  America  than  in 
Europe:  ardour  for  the  new,  enthusiasm  for  progress, 
confidence  in  our  own  strength.  In  war,  we  fight  like 
the  Romans,  and  in  peace,  we  turn  our  eyes  away  from 
bloody  spectacles.  We  should  hold  the  gladiatorial 
games  in  no  whit  less  horror  than  the  most  pious  of 
Christian  monks.  We  trade  like  the  Phoenicians  and 
we  love  knowledge  like  the  Greeks.  We  appreciate 
liberty  and  we  appreciate  authority.  Does  not  all  this 
constitute  real  progress?  And  does  it  not  suffice  to 
counterbalance  certain  other  defects  of  ours,  such  as 
intemperance  and  the  immoderate  desire  for  riches.'* 

I  think  so.  But  that  does  not  mean  that  we  are  at 
liberty  to  abandon  ourselves  freely  to  our  vices  and 
defects,  under  the  pretext  that  they  are  compensated 
for  by  other  virtues.  It  is  the  duty  of  every  civilisation, 
as  of  every  man,  to  make  himself  as  perfect  as  possible. 
And  this  duty  we  must  not  forget,  not  even  in  the  midst 
of  the  immeasurable  triumphs  of  the  richest,  most 
powerful,  and  wisest  civilisation  that  has  ever  yet  seen 
the  light  of  day. 


Part  III 
Europe  and  America 


"3 


THE  AMERICAN   DEFINITION   OF   PROGRESS 

nPHE  two  visits  I  paid  to  South  and  North  America 
-'■  between  1907  and  1909  were  the  result  of  a  lucky- 
chance,  not  of  a  prearranged  plan.  In  1906,  after  hav- 
ing been  plunged  for  ten  years  in  the  study  of  Roman 
history,  I  had  no  idea  of  crossing  the  Atlantic,  much  less 
of  writing  a  book  on  America  and  Europe.  I  had  never 
dreamt  that  my  long  researches  in  the  great  cemetery 
of  the  ancient  world  might  start  me  suddenly  one  day 
along  the  road  which  leads  to  the  New  World.  But 
destiny  willed  it  so.  In  November  of  1906,  by  invita- 
tion of  the  College  de  France,  I  delivered  in  Paris  a 
course  of  lectures  on  the  history  of  Augustus,  in  which 
I  summarised  the  fourth  and  fifth  volumes  of  my 
Greatness  and  Decline  of  Rome.  Tliere  happened  to  be 
at  Paris  at  that  time  a  distinguislicd  Argentine,  Sefior 
Emilio  Mitre,  son  of  that  General  Mitre  who  was  one 
of  the  Republic's  most  cons])icuous  politicians  during 
the  second  half  of  the  nineteenth  century.  He  himself 
was  a  man  of  importance  in  the  ])olitical  world,  and 
proprietor  of  the  Nacion,  which  is  not  only  the  biggest. 


ii6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

most  serious,  and  most  authoritative  newspaper  in 
Latin  America,  but  one  of  the  leading  newspapers  of  the 
world,  I  had  contributed  to  this  paper  for  years,  so  I 
called  on  Mitre  in  Paris.  He  came  to  hear  my  lectures, 
and  the  day  before  the  concluding  one,  November 
29th, — he  was  due  to  sail  for  Buenos  Aires  on  December 
1st, — he  came  to  me  with  a  proposal  that  I  should  go  to 
Argentina  and  there  deliver  some  lectures.  I  accepted, 
impelled  chiefly  by  curiosity  to  see  that  vast  and  rich 
country  which,  for  the  last  ten  years,  had  been  so  much 
talked  about  in  Italy,  and  to  which  during  the  last  half- 
century  so  many  Italians  had  emigrated.  I  accordingly 
prepared  my  lectures,  and  on  June  7,  1907,  I  sailed  from 
Genoa  for  Buenos  Aires  with  my  wife  and  little  boy. 
Every  European  who  crosses  the  Atlantic  and  can  wield 
his  pen  with  any  sort  of  effect  writes  his  impressions 
when  he  gets  back.  Naturally,  therefore,  I  too  had 
promised  several  reviews  and  one  publisher  to  bring 
back  with  me  a  volume  of  "Impressions  of  Argentina." 
At  six  P.M.  on  June  8th,  we  put  in  to  Barcelona. 
Directly  the  steamer  came  alongside,  the  Brazilian 
consul  came  on  board  in  search  of  me.  He  handed  me 
a  despatch  from  Baron  di  Rio  Branco,  the  Brazilian 
Minister  of  Foreign  affairs,  who  invited  me  in  the  name 
of  the  Brazilian  Academy  to  stop  at  Rio,  and  read  a 
paper  there.  I  begged  the  consul  to  telegraph  to  Baron 
di  Rio  Branco  that  I  could  not  stop  on  my  voyage  out, 
as  I  was  expected  at  Buenos  Aires;  but  that  on  my 
return  I  should  be  delighted  to  accept  his  kind  invita- 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  117 

tion.  As  the  steamer  was  to  put  in  at  Rio,  I  could 
arrange  matters  with  him  en  route.  As  the  steamer 
resumed  her  journey,  and  passed  out  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean into  the  vast  wilderness  of  the  ocean,  I  busied 
myself  with  some  books  of  philosophy  which  I  had 
brought  along,  amongst  them,  some  of  Buddha's  dis- 
courses, which  had  just  been  published  in  an  Italian 
translation. 

On  June  24th,  at  5  P.M.,  we  reached  the  bay  of  Rio, 
one  of  the  most  marvellous  spots  in  the  world.  But 
while  we  were  gazing  from  the  deck  in  admiration  at 
the  gloomy  mountains  standing  round  about  and  the 
woods  which  covered  them,  at  the  city  rising  from  the 
sea  towards  the  mountains,  and  the  roseate  glow  of 
the  setting  sun  upon  the  bay,  we  descried  a  steam  launch 
laden  with  people  coming  towards  us.  It  was  a  deputa- 
tion from  the  Brazilian  Academy  and  from  the  Ministry 
of  Foreign  Affairs,  which  was  coming  to  take  us  for  a 
motor  tour  through  the  city,  and  afterwards  to  take 
us  to  dinner  at  the  Ministry  of  Foreign  Affairs,  where 
Baron  di  Rio  Branco  was  expecting  us.  Yv'c  hastened 
ashore,  and  found  some  motors  waiting  for  us  at  the 
Pharoux  jetty.    We  jumped  in,  and  were  off. 

As  long  as  life  lasts,  I  shall  never  forget  that  drive 
at  sunset,  between  the  dying  light  of  evening  and  the 
first  gleams  of  the  electric  lamps,  which  were  just  be- 
ginning to  light  up  the  marvellous  city  built  in  the 
midst  of  the  remains  of  the  primeval  forest  on  the 
borders  of  the  sea,  on  the  hills,  and  on  the  mountains. 


ii8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

I  shall  never  forget  our  dash  through  endless  streets, 
with  hurried  glimpses  of  multi-coloured  houses,  sumptu- 
ous palaces  half  hidden  in  superb  gardens,  avenues  of 
gigantic  palms  which  stretched  far  away  into  the 
night,  glorious  promenades  along  the  seashore,  and 
mountain  peaks  which  beetled  above  the  city.  I 
longed  to  stop  the  car.  But  time  pressed,  and  after 
having  hurriedly  traversed  the  whole  city,  we  reached, 
about  7.30  P.M.,  Itamaraty  (as  the  palace  of  the 
Ministry  of  Foreign  Affairs  is  called),  where  a  select 
company  of  men  and  women  were  awaiting  us  in  rooms 
ablaze  with  light.  As  soon  as  we  had  been  introduced, 
dinner  was  served;  a  most  sumptuous  dinner,  into 
which,  among  the  most  luscious  ragouts  of  the  French 
cuisine,  the  thoughtful  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  had 
introduced  several  Brazilian  dishes.  I  remember  the 
palmiti,  a  dish  of  palm-pith,  cooked  as  we  cook  aspara- 
gus, and  really  delicious ;  and  bakiiry,  a  white  fruit  from 
the  equator,  preserved  in  syrup,  which  reminded  me 
strongly  of  the  smell  of  magnolia  and  gave  me  the 
illusion  of  eating  marvellous  flowers. 

Speeches  followed  the  dinner,  whereupon  we  re- 
turned on  shipboard,  but  before  doing  so  I  had  arranged 
in  a  corner  of  the  drawing-room  with  Baron  di  Rio 
Branco,  Giuseppe  Graga  Aranha,  now  Brazilian  Minis- 
ter at  the  Hague,  and  a  distinguished  writer,  who  was 
then  the  Minister's  secretary,  and  Alachado  de  Assis, 
the  great  writer  who  was  then  President  of  the  Brazilian 
Academy,  that  I  would  stop  a  couple  of  months  in 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  119 

Brazil  on  my  way  back,  repeat  my  Buenos  Aires 
lectures,  and  visit  the  country.  At  1 1  p.m.,  the  steamer 
weighed  anchor  and  left  the  dark  bay,  in  which  there 
was  nothing  now  to  be  seen  but  the  glitter  of  an  infinite 
number  of  tiny  lights. 

That  night,  however,  I  did  not  sleep,  so  stunned  and 
dazzled  was  I  by  that  first  fantastic  glimpse  of  America, 
which  will  remain  one  of  the  most  singular  experiences 
of  my  life,  though,  so  far,  my  life  has  not  been  devoid 
of  strange  and  curious  chances.  I  had  started  from 
Europe  with  no,  or  practically  no,  knowledge  of  the 
two  Americas,  excepting  the  little  I  had  picked  up  here 
and  there  in  books  and  papers  which  I  happened  to 
read.  Consequently,  my  opinion  of  America  was  the 
same  as  that  formed  by  other  Europeans:  that  it  was 
the  country  of  material  realities,  of  business,  of  fortunes 
made  rapidly,  of  wealth  stripped  of  every  ornament, 
poetry,  beauty,  and  ideal  refinement ;  that  rude  and 
bustling  America  with  which  all  cultured  Europeans  love 
to  contrast  Europe  as  the  continent  of  the  Ideal,  vrhcre 
beauty,  wisdom,  and  every  refinement  of  civil  life 
flourish.  And  behold!  my  first  impression  of  America 
was  as  of  a  strip  of  India,  and  the  first  American  city 
I  had  seen  reminded  me  of  the  East,  and  especially, 
for  some  reason  or  other,  of  Bagdad,  or  rather,  of  the 
somewhat  fantastic  idea  of  Bagdad  which  I  had  con- 
cc-ivcd  in  the  days  when  I  read  more  often  and  more 
ardently  than  I  do  now,  the  Orirjitcles  of  X'ictor  Hugo, 
and   the   other   romantic   poets   of   ihe   middle  of   the 


120  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

nineteenth  century.  And  in  that  city,  I  had  been  pre- 
sent at  a  succulent  and  magnificent  banquet,  at  which, 
amidst  the  refinements  of  the  old  civilisation  of  Europe, 
I  had  tasted  the  unknown  rarities  of  the  tropics,  in  the 
company  of  elegant,  cultured,  and  refined  guests,  with 
whom  I  had  discussed  in  French  the  latest  literary  and 
artistic  novelties,  as  if  we  had  been  on  the  banks  of  the 
Seine.    Was  it  a  reality  or  a  dream? 

Quite  other  surprises  were,  however,  in  store  for  me 
on  my  wanderings  in  America.  Four  days  later,  on 
June  27th,  we  reached  Buenos  Aires,  where  we  were 
joyfully  welcomed  by  a  number  of  kind  folk,  who  had 
spared  neither  trouble  nor  care  to  make  our  stay  agree- 
able to  us.  Then  began  four  months  of  really  strenuous 
life,  to  borrow  Theodore  Roosevelt's  favourite  expres- 
sion. Conferences,  receptions,  banquets,  visits  to  hospi- 
tals, schools,  factories,  workshops,  and  ranches;  trips 
by  boat,  train,  and  motor-car.  It  was  a  real  moto 
perpetuo.  I  passed  the  month  of  July  at  Buenos  Aires. 
In  August,  I  plunged  into  the  interior,  visiting  succes- 
sively Rosario,  Mendoza,  Cordova,  Tucuman,  Santiago, 
dell  'Estero,  Santa  Fe,  Parana,  and  penetrating  right 
up  to  the  foot  of  the  Andes.  I  travelled  about  ten 
thousand  kilometres  in  the  railway  train,  observing, 
collecting  documents,  asking  and  answering  questions, 
and  discussing  problems.  All  these,  however,  were 
labours  less  tiring  than  another,  which  became  by  de- 
grees the  principal  preoccupation  of  my  mind  during 
those  two  months:  the  endeavour  to  put  to  flight  a 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  121 

demon  which  kept  obstinately  springing  up  before  my 
eyes,  in  conversations,  on  journeys,  during  visits,  dur- 
ing dinner-parties,  notwithstanding  all  the  efforts  I 
made  to  keep  it  at  a  distance;  and  which  seemed  deter- 
mined to  reappear  at  every  moment  and  wound  me  in 
the  inmost  recesses  of  m^y  European  pride  and  in  my 
most  touchy  European  susceptibilities.  What  was  this 
demon?  It  was  American  progress.  Every  day  I  had 
pointed  out  to  me  on  my  rapid  journcA's,  immense  and 
marvellous  ranches,  herds  of  many  thousand  head, 
markets  overflowing  with  wealth,  magnificent  schools, 
and  superb  hospitals.  I  was  given  descriptions  and 
demonstrations,  in  figures  and  in  fact,  of  the  rapid 
spread  of  cultivation,  the  increase  of  production,  the 
bewildering  prosperity  of  the  banks,  the  expansion  of 
Buenos  Aires,  now  become  the  second  city  of  the  Latin 
world  in  Vs-ealth  and  population,  after  Paris.  They  were 
all  interesting  things  to  observe  and  study.  Neverthe- 
less, too  m-any  of  those  who  showed  them  to  me  im- 
plicitly or  explicitly  established  comparisons  between 
this  rapid  increase  and  transformation  in  everything 
Argentine,  and  the  miore  deliberate  advance  of  the 
great  nations  of  Europe,  and  deduced  the  conclusion 
that  Argentina  was  a  more  progressive  and  advanced 
country. 

The  word  "progress"  is  one  of  those  which  is  much 
misused  in  Europe.  I  had  no  sooner  landed  in  Argen- 
tina, however,  than  I  reco'^^nised  that  the  word  had 
quite  a  different   sound   and  significance  on  that  side 


122  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  the  water  from  what  it  has  in  Europe.  The  standard 
by  which  my  new  transatlantic  friends  were  unanimous 
in  measuring  progress  was  the  rapidity  of  transforma- 
tion and  the  magnitude  of  the  results.  New,  modern, 
larger,  were  to  them  synonyms  of  progress  and  of 
improvement.  Consequently,  they  had  only  to  cast 
their  eyes  round  their  own  country  to  find  reasons  for 
self-satisfaction.  But  this  conception  of  progress  at 
first  somewhat  amused  and  somewhat  irritated  me, 
just  as  the  naive  touches  of  vanity  in  the  young  often 
amuse  and  irritate  grown  men.  Many  a  time,  when 
we  were  discussing  the  progress  of  Argentina  and  the 
comparisons,  tacit  or  explicit,  which  were  made  with 
Europe,  have  I  said  to  my  Argentine  friends : 

"Undoubtedly  the  effort  which  you  are  making  is  a 
noble  one,  and  a  paying  one.  In  thirty  years,  you  have 
increased  your  wealth  ten-,  twenty-,  even  thirty-fold. 
You  have  been  wonderfully  quick  in  extending  cultiva- 
tion, railways,  and  population  over  the  vast  territory 
which  Fortune  has  given  you.  You  are  now  flooding 
the  world  with  riches,  and,  profiting  by  the  experience 
of  others,  you  can  transform,  reshape,  and  make  perfect 
your  public  services,  your  institutions,  and  your  whole 
mode  of  living  in  the  smallest  number  of  years. 

"You  make  a  great  mistake,  however,  if  you  think 
that  the  contrast  between  the  rapidity  of  your  growth 
and  your  changes  and  the  vslowness  and  immutability 
of  Europe  is  any  proof  of  your  own  nearer  approach  to 
perfection.     That  rapidity  is  a  phenomenon  of  youth. 


"> "? 


The  American  Definition  of  Proi^rcss   12 


A  child's  weight  and  height  double  themselves  every 
six  months,  year,  two  years,  or  three  years  in  the  first 
years  of  its  life;  while  an  adult  stops  growing  or  grows 
so  slowly  as  to  be  hardly  aware  that  he  is  doing  so. 
Would  you  deduce  from  this  that  a  boy  of  six  years  of 
age  is  superior  to  a  man  of  forty?  No.  Childhood  and 
manhood  are  two  phases  of  life.  Each  has  its  own 
necessity,  its  own  function,  its  own  advantages  and 
disadvantages.  It  is  no  more  possible  to  compare  them 
than  it  is  to  com.pare  day  and  night,  dawn  and  twilight, 
winter  and  summer;  I  can  see  no  essential  diflerence 
between  the  countries  of  Europe  and  your  own.  We 
are  all  children  of  the  same  civilisation;  we  have  been 
nursed  at  the  same  breast.  We  are  all  like  one  to  the 
other,  though  we  may  differ  one  from  the  other  as 
brothers,  or,  if  you  prefer  it.  as  cousins  do.  So  an 
American  progress,  different  from  European  progress, 
does  not  exist,  though  there  are  countries  whose 
transformation,  owing  to  external  circumstances,  may 
be  retarded  or  accelerated.  You  have  political  institu- 
tions and  social  orders  of  less  antiquity,  and,  therefore, 
of  less  rigidity  and  less  strength  than  those  of  Europe. 
You  also  have  a  territory  to  exploit  which  is  vaster, 
very  much  vaster,  and  much  more  easy  to  exploit, 
because  civilisation  supplies  you,  ready  to  hand,  with 
almost  perfect  instruments  for  such  exploitation.  There 
you  ha\-e  the  real  difference  between  us." 

Though    these    arguments    were    listened     to    v.-ith 
courteous  attention,  they  made  hut  a  slight  impression 


124  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

on  my  hearers.  I  very  soon  realised  that  American  pro- 
gress, the  rapid  increase,  that  is  to  say,  of  the  wealth  of 
Argentina  and  the  incessant  modernisation  of  the  cus- 
toms and  institutions  of  the  country,  were  a  sort  of 
national  religion,  which  was  accepted  by  most  people 
with  a  blind  credence.  So  in  the  end,  I  was  persuaded 
that  this  ardent  faith  in  progress  must  be  attributed 
to  the  preponderating  influence  of  Buenos  Aires,  that 
immense  city,  almost  half  the  population  of  which  is 
composed  of  European  immigrants  in  search  of  wealth. 
For  it  is  the  largest  port,  the  principal  emporium,  and 
the  financial  centre  of  the  Republic,  through  which 
passes  most  of  the  export  and  import  trade,  nearly  all 
the  great  stream  of  wealth  which  flows  out  from  the 
vast  territory  over  the  world,  and  from  the  world 
ebl)S  back  to  it  again:  a  rich  American  city,  after  the 
European  picture  of  such.  It  is  only  natural  that  a  city 
wliosc  wealth  and  size  arc  being  multiplied  by  the 
rapid  development  of  the  country  should  have  adopted 
American  progress  as  its  religion,  and  should,  through 
its  influence,  have  imposed  that  religion  on  the  whole 
country.  The  conclusion  of  the  matter  was,  however, 
that  the  Argentine  conception  of  progress  was  not  and 
could  not  be  anything  but  the  passing  exaltation  of  a 
fortunate  country  which,  profiting  by  circumstances 
unusually  favourable,  could  watch  its  wealth  growing 
round  it  with  bewildering  rapidity.  That,  at  any  rate, 
was  the  conclusion  I  came  to,  and  I  thought  it  both 
reasonable  and  justifiable. 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  125 

With  this  idea  in  my  head,  after  a  laborious,  agree- 
able, and  instructive  stay  of  two  months  in  Argentina,  I 
sailed  for  Rio,  making  on  my  way  thither  a  brief  halt  at 
Montevideo.  I  expected  to  find  in  Rio  another  Ameri- 
can city  like  Buenos  Aires.  I  was,  however,  mistaken. 
Brazil  is  not,  like  Argentina,  a  single  body  with  one 
enormous  head.  Its  economic  activity  is  more  diffuse 
and  centres  in  different  cities, — for  coffee,  in  Sao 
Paulo;  for  rubber,  in  Manaos;  for  each  one  of  the  other 
great  articles  of  production,  in  other  cities  scattered 
over  the  vast  territory.  Rio  de  Janeiro,  though  the 
chief  political  and  intellectual  centre  of  tlie  Confedera- 
tion, cannot,  therefore,  be  called  either  the  emporium 
or  the  port,  or  the  economic  capital  par  excellence. 
Consequently,  it  differs  w-idely  from  Buenos  Aires.  It 
is  less  crowded,  noisy,  and  busy.  It  lives,  I  might  al- 
most say,  in  the  shade  of  its  gardens  and  between  the 
forest  and  the  sea,  quietly  and  reposedly.  It  is  the 
only  great  American  city  I  have  visited  in  which  people 
walk  at  a  leisurely  pace  and  not  at  headlong  speed; 
and  it  not  only  lives  reposedly,  but  it  thinks,  and  even 
dreams  a  little. 

While  at  Buenos  Aires,  we  had  lived  surrounded  by 
men  of  action;  we  found  at  Rio  a  coterie  composed 
almost  exclusively  of  intellectuals — literary  men,  jour- 
nalists, historians,  philosophers,  and  jurists.  Most  of 
them  were  state  officials  and  members  of  the  Brazilian 
Academy, — an  academy  founded  about  ten  years  ago 
and  modelled   exactly   on   the  lines  of  the  Academic 


126  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Frangaise, — composed,  like  it,  of  forty  members,  elected 
in  the  same  way,  and  admitted  with  the  same  ceremon- 
ial. In  a  small  inn  situated  on  the  slopes  of  Corcovado, 
on  the  outskirts  of  the  town  and  the  forest,  whose 
roads  were  shaded  by  secular  trees,  we  lived  for  six 
weeks,  just  as  Plato  and  his  friends  lived  in  the  gardens 
of  the  Academy ;  discussing  art,  literature,  philosophy, 
right,  and  morality  with  the  friends  whom  Graga 
Aranha,  the  diplomatist  and  man  of  letters  chosen  by 
Baron  di  Rio  Branco  to  do  us  the  honours  of  Brazil, 
gathered  round  us  almost  daily.  At  no  moment  of  my 
life  have  I  felt  myself  so  much  detached  from,  and  so 
superior  to,  the  accustomed  preoccupations  which  form 
the  groundwork  of  ordinary  existence  in  the  modern 
world.  And  when  I  found  myself  living  amongst  per- 
sons for  whom  the  culture  of  Europe  represented  the 
supreme  blessing  of  life,  the  greatest  pride  of  civilisa- 
tion, for  a  moment  I  believed  myself  freed  from  that 
demon  of  American  progress  which  had  dogged  me  in 
Argentina. 

It  was  an  illusion,  however,  which  did  not  last  long. 
Brazil  is  a  country  slightly  older  than  Argentina. 
Owing  to  this  reason,  to  its  much  greater  size,  to  the 
variety  of  its  climates  and  lands,  which  make  it  im- 
possible to  concentrate  in  a  single  city  the  direction  of 
the  whole  of  national  life,  and  to  other  contingent 
reasons  which  it  would  take  too  long  to  enumerate  here, 
Brazil  has  not  developed  in  the  last  twenty  years  so 
rapidly  as  has  Argentina.     It  has,  however,  developed 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  127 

much  more  quickly  than  any  European  country.  I 
speedily  saw  that  the  rapidity  of  this  progress  was  the 
great  national  pride  of  the  Brazilians,  even  of  those 
men  of  letters,  philosophers,  and  writers,  who  professed 
to  be  such  devoted  disciples  and  admirers  of  Europe. 
In  the  same  way  the  great  national  preoccupation  was 
the  acceleration,  as  far  as  possible,  of  the  progress  and 
increase  of  riches,  and  the  exploiting  and  modernisation 
of  the  country,  so  that  Brazil  might  not  appear  inferior 
in  this  particular  to  the  other  great  states  of  America. 
An  energetic  administration  had  just  finished  the  re- 
sanitation  of  Rio  de  Janeiro,  destroying,  at  the  cost  of 
vast  public  works,  all  the  breeding-places  of  yellow 
fever  which  up  till  then  had  infested  it.  The  adminis- 
tration was  then  renovating  it  from  top  to  bottom, 
opening  streets  and  squares  in  the  middle  of  the  old 
quarters,  constructing  spacious  promenades  and  gar- 
dens, and  sumptuous  public  edifices,  in  a  word,  giving 
air  and  light  and  splendour  and  beauty  to  a  city  which 
was  already  beautiful  in  addition  to  being  placed  in 
a  unique  situation.  I  think  there  must  be  very  few 
cities  which  in  a  few  years  have  managed  to  destroy 
and  rebuild,  according  to  new  plans,  so  large  a  part  of 
themselves.  Naturally  the  work  has  cost  millions; 
but  on  the  few  occasions  on  which  I  timidly  dared  to 
make  a  remark  to  this  effect,  I  received  the  laughing 
answer:  "We  are  optimists;  and  we  believe  in  progress  1" 
This  a:dilitian  transformation  of  Rio  de  Janeiro  filled 
with  pride  all   l^razilians,   including  my  lettered  and 


128  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

philosophical  friends,  on  account  of  its  rapidity  and 
grandeur;  and  their  pride  was  swelled  by  the  thought 
that  no  European  states,  but  perhaps  the  United  States 
of  North  America  alone,  their  great  elder  brother,  could 
have  done  so  much. 

Everybody  thought,  moreover,  that  the  whole  of 
Brazil  ought  to  be  modernised  just  like  Rio,  from  top 
to  bottom.  I  visited  Sao  Paulo,  the  great  coffee- 
producing  state.  I  traversed  from  end  to  end  Minas 
Geraes,  the  great  agricultural  and  mineral  state  which, 
as  a  symbol,  as  it  were,  of  its  intention  to  modernise 
itself  entirely,  has  recently  constructed  a  smiling  and 
graceful  new  capitol,  Bello  Horizonte,  in  a  most  pic- 
turesque position  crowning  the  hoary  Ouro  Preto. 
Everywhere  I  found  politicians,  officials,  professors^ 
literary  men,  commercial  men,  bankers,  Brazilian  and 
European  immigrants,  united  in  the  same  thought: 
that  railways  must  be  built,  machinery  bought,  able 
engineers  engaged,  mines  explored,  cultivation  ex- 
tended, and  industries  founded  to  increase  the 
country's  rate  of  progress  by  modernising  it  entirely. 
It  was  useless  for  me  to  try  to  prove  even  to  those  of 
my  Rio  acquaintances  who  were  endowed  with  the 
highest  and  finest  intellectual  culture,  that  this 
conception  of  progress  was  too  simple  and  material; 
that  real  progress  is  not  to  make  new  or  to  make 
quickly,  but  to  make  better;  that  it  is  not  enough 
to  augment  wealth,  but  that  it  is  necessary  also 
to  put  it  to  good  use,  a  more  difficult  problem  than 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  129 

the  producing  of  it.  I  tried  to  convince  my  friends  that 
if  so  simple  and  material  a  notion  of  progress  acquired 
a  strong  hold  on  the  popular  mind,  the  public  would 
infallibly  be  impelled  to  create,  not  a  loft}-  and  noble 
civilisation,  but  a  sort  of  opulent  barbarism.  In  Brazil, 
as  much  as  in  Argentina,  my  arguments  beat  harmlessly 
against  a  faith  and  a  passion  which  demands  no  proofs. 
"American  Progress"  for  the  Brazilians  too  was  the 
great  historical  force  of  the  future,  which  is  going  to 
create  the  new  world,  and  the  new  civilisation  whose 
dim  foreshadowing  seems  to  be  agitating  the  masses 
at  the  present  time. 

We  returned  to  Italy  in  November.  I  recrossed  the 
ocean  from  Rio  de  Janeiro  to  Genoa  in  fifteen  days, 
during  which  I  reread  my  books  of  philosophy.  But 
the  pages  of  Bergson,  Kant,  and  Comtc,  which  I  read 
in  mid-ocean,  no  longer  riveted  my  attention  as  they 
had  on  the  way  out.  For  in  the  time  for  thought 
afforded  me  by  the  crossing,  far  from  the  world  and  its 
troubles,  I  plunged  day  by  day  in  a  more  intense  medi- 
tation on  American  progress,  which,  of  all  the  things 
and  phenomena  I  had  witnessed,  was  that  which  liad 
left  on  me  the  liveliest  impressions.  It  was  clear  tliat 
it  was  not  a  theoretical  idea,  but  a  passion,  a  faith,  a 
religion  fervently  embraced  by  ncarh'  everybody.  All 
the  arguments  which  I  had  advanced  to  subject  it  to 
criticism  had  been  fruitless;  and  not  only  ignorant  men, 
and  those  eager  to  make  money,  bin  the  most  higlily 
cultivated  minds,  the  very  intellectual  elite  of  America, 
9 


130  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

were  blind  to  the  contradictions  and  logical  short- 
comings of  this  conception.  Nevertheless,  was  not  this 
but  an  additional  reason  for  studying  this  phenomenon 
thoroughly?  It  is  not  ideas  which  move  and  transform 
the  world,  but  passions;  and  a  passion,  even  if  it  be 
absurd,  is  a  thousand  times  more  powerful  than  a  wise 
idea. 

Now  it  was  not  difficult  to  see  what  would  happen  if 
this  religion  of  American  progress  spread  through  the 
world.  Europe  would  lose,  so  to  speak,  her  rights  of 
historical  primogeniture,  and  all  her  ancient  civilisa- 
tion would  lose  a  great  part  of  its  value.  If  the  rapid 
increase  of  riches  is  the  supreme  measure  of  civilisa- 
tion, and  if,  in  consequence,  the  efforts  of  a  people  must 
be  concentrated  on  everything  which  can  accelerate 
this  increase,  it  is  clear  that  the  most  ancient,  populous, 
and  glorious  countries  of  Europe  will  not  be  able  to 
keep  pace  with  the  young  countries  and  with  the 
nations  which  are  masters  of  vast  territories;  and  that, 
bit  by  bit,  the  most  glorious  civilisations  of  Europe  will 
come  to  be  regarded  by  the  eyes  of  the  rising  genera- 
tions as  relics  and  fossils  of  another  age.  This  danger 
no  longer  appeared  to  me  so  distant  and  hypothetical 
as  to  many  other  Europeans.  After  what  I  had  seen 
in  America,  many  facts  and  thoughts  and  tendencies 
to  which  I  had  hitherto  paid  scarcely  any  attention  in 
Europe,  seemed  to  me  to  acquire  a  new  significance. 
I  saw  everywhere,  even  in  the  ancient  world,  traces  and 
proofs  of  the  rapid  spread  of  the  American  idea  of 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  131 

progress,  especially  among  the  nations  like  Germany, 
which  have  developed  industry  to  a  great,  perhaps  a 
too  great,  extent ;  and  in  all  the  countries,  classes,  and 
professions  which  have  identified  their  interests  most 
completely  with  those  of  industry.  So  the  enemy  who 
threatened  the  destruction  of  the  ancient  civilisation  of 
Europe  had  already  invaded  the  Old  World. 

It  was  while  I  was  meditating  on  these  thoughts  in 
mid-ocean  that  the  idea  occurred  to  me  of  writing 
something  different  from  a  book  of  impressions  on 
Argentina  and  Brazil.  Too  many  books  of  impressions 
of  the  two  Americas  are  written  in  Europe;  and  litera- 
ture of  this  vSort,  as  copious  as  it  is  useless,  has  justly 
satiated  the  public.  Inasmuch  as  this  itlea  of  progress 
implies  a  great  conflict  of  tendencies,  from  which  may 
arise  a  profound  uphea\'al  of  our  civilisation,  why 
should  I  not  contrast  in  a  book  the  two  conceptions  of 
progress,  that  which  America  has  created  and  is  trying 
to  impose  on  the  world,  and  that  whicli  is  even  now 
professed  in  Europe  by  the  classes  most  faitliful  to 
tradition,  and  which  they  ought  to  seek  to  defend?  If 
I  succeeded  in  gi\'ing  a  vi\'id  re|)rcscntation  of  this 
conflict,  should  I  not  have  described  a  living  part  of 
America  better  than  if  I  had  merely  accumulated 
thousands  of  detached  impn^ssions  and  observations? 
And  so  the  idea  flashed  across  my  mind  of  writing  a 
dialogue  introducing  some  Europeans  and  Americans 
who  on  board  a  steamer  in  mid-ocean  discussed  luiropc 
and  America,   that  is  to  say,   progress,   in   the  sense 


132  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

proper  to  the  word  as  well  as  in  the  sense  given  to  it 
by  the  Americans.  Is  not  the  dialogue  an  ancient  and 
glorious  literary  form?  It  is  true  that  for  many  reasons 
it  has  lately  been  neglected,  one  particular  reason  being, 
that  in  modem  life,  busy  and  exhausting  as  it  is,  it  is 
difficult  to  find  a  scene  which  will  give  verisimilitude 
to  a  conversation  lasting  several  days.  Modern  civilisa- 
tion is  a  civilisation  of  much  action  and  little  discussion. 
However,  there  is  still  one  scene  left  in  modern  life  on 
which  one  can  stage  with  artistic  verisimilitude  a  dis- 
cussion lasting  several  days:  a  transatlantic  liner.  A 
liner  is  perhaps  the  only  spot  in  the  modem  world 
where  one  may  find  discussion  holding  the  field. 
Usually  discussions  on  board  ship  deal  with  frivolous 
and  empty  topics.  Why  might  not  a  writer  suppose, 
however,  that  for  once  in  a  way,  four  or  five  serious- 
minded  persons  met  on  board  a  liner  and  began  a 
casual  talk  which  later  developed  into  a  discussion 
of  one  of  the  gravest  of  the  problems  which  oppress 
our  own  generation,  no  less  than  every  one  of  its 
predecessors? 

Among  the  persons  whose  acquaintance  I  had  made 
during  the  voyage,  some  appeared  to  me  to  lend  them- 
selves to  the  role  of  interlocutor  in  the  dialogue.  So, 
directly  I  got  back,  I  began  to  sketch  out  my  dialogue. 
It  was  then  that  I  experienced  a  curious  phenomenon. 
With  every  fresh  attempt  I  made  to  embody  in  certain 
characteristic  personages  the  American  idea  of  progress, 
as  I  had  observed  it  in  so  many  of  my  friends  on  that 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  133 

side,  and  the  European  idea,  as  I  had  many  times 
defended  it,  both  ideas  seemed  to  me  to  evaporate, 
and  to  lose  consistency  and  colour.  That  conflict  of 
tendencies,  ideas,  and  passions  which  had  seemed  to  me 
so  lively  and  so  profound  in  my  meditations  in  mid- 
ocean  appeared  to  have  melted  away  after  I  had 
touched  the  soil  of  old  Europe.  The  dialogue  which  I 
was  writing  seemed  to  me  cold,  dead,  and  academic. 

I  was  torn  in  two  directions  by  these  difTficulties,  un- 
certain whether  to  abandon  the  enterprise,  and  asking 
myself  whether  American  progress  had  not  been  a 
passing  hallucination  of  the  voyage;  when  towards  the 
middle  of  February,  1908,  I  received  from  North 
America  a  new  surprise  of  a  still  greater  and  more 
agreeable  nature,  in  the  shape  of  a  letter  from  Baron 
Eduardo  Mayor  de  Planches,  at  that  time  Italian 
Ambassador  at  Washington,  in  which  he  told  me  that 
President  Roosevelt  at  his  last  diplomatic  reception 
had  expressed  to  him  his  wish  to  see  me  in  the  United 
States,  and  to  have  me  as  his  guest  for  a  few  days  at 
the  White  House  before  his  presidential  term  ended. 
At  any  time,  so  courteous  an  invitation  from  a  man  for 
whose  culture,  intellect,  and  statesmanlike  qualities  I 
had  so  great  an  admiration,  would  have  given  me  much 
pleasure.  My  joy  was  much  increased,  however,  by 
the  fact  of  its  having  arrived  two  months  after  my 
return  from  South  America.  A  visit  to  the  United 
States  directly  after  one  to  vSouth  America  was  a  rare 
stroke  of  luck.    For,  to  tell  the  truth,  in  visiting  Brazil 


134  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  Argentina,  I  had  seen  only  a  fragment  of  the  New 
World.  But  to  come  to  know  that  great  New- World 
State  which  by  itself  personifies  America  in  the  eyes  of 
all,  and  to  come  to  know  the  two  largest  states  of  South 
America  into  the  bargain,  was  equivalent  to  saying 
that  I  had  studied  at  least  what  was  most  important, 
characteristic,  and  deserving  of  study  in  the  boundless 
continent  which  Columbus  discovered.  All  the  curios- 
ity to  which  the  rumours  and  legends  current  in 
Europe  about  the  United  States  had  given  birth  in  me, 
and  which  was  dominant  in  the  recesses  of  my  mind, 
awoke  to  life.  I  forgot  the  problem  of  progress,  the 
doubts  which  tormented  me,  and  the  problems  which 
I  had  posed  to  myself  on  my  travels  in  Argentina,  as 
well  as  the  dialogue  I  intended  to  write,  in  my  prepara- 
tion for  my  fresh  journey  and  for  the  lectures  in  Roman 
history  which  I  was  scheduled  to  give  at  the  Lowell 
Institute,  at  Columbia  University,  and  at  the  University 
of  Chicago.  I  set  to  work  to  read  as  many  books 
as  I  could  about  North  America.  I  resumed  the  mantle 
of  Roman  historian  to  jjrepare  my  course  of  lectures 
and  gave  no  further  thought  to  the  book  on  America 
which  I  had  promised  to  write. 

On  November  i,  1908,  I  sailed  for  New  York,  and  a 
three  months'  course  of  the  intense  life  began  again  for 
me;  rapid  journeys,  incessant  visits,  interviews  with 
journalists,  hundreds  of  conversations,  banquets,  recep- 
tions, speeches,  and  inquiries.  I  visited  schools,  hospi- 
tals, universities,  jjrisons,  law-courts,  factories,  banks, 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  135 

and  co-operative  enterprises.  I  made  the  acquaintance 
of  millionaires  and  artisans,  industrialists  and  pro- 
fessors, lawyers  and  journalists.  I  managed  to  get  a 
peep  into  the  wealthy  abodes  of  the  rich  families  of  the 
great  cities  of  the  East,  and  into  the  little  houses  in 
which  the  middle  classes  drag  out  a  crowded  and 
pinched  existence.  I  witnessed  the  frenzy  for  work, 
the  incessant  activity,  the  unending  agitation  which 
wears  out  every  class  in  America.  Most  important  of 
all,  however,  I  saw  reappear  before  me — and  this  time 
in  gigantic  form,  monstrous,  unrestrained,  almost  sub- 
lime in  its  savage  energy — that  demon  of  American 
progress  which  had  impressed  me  so  much  in  Brazil 
and  Argentina,  comparatively  small  though  it  had 
there  appeared  to  me,  and  which  in  Europe  seemed  to 
me  to  have  almost  melted  away.  Was  it  not  this  which 
imbued  everything  American  with  that  startling  air  of 
novelty,  extravagance,  and  grandeur,  which  stunned 
and  almost  frightened  me?  So  I  devoted  myself  not 
only  to  the  accumulation  of  impressions,  informations, 
and  recollections  in  profusion;  I  also  set  to  work  in 
the  tumult  of  American  life  to  think  again  about 
American  progress.  I  made  an  effort  to  dive  deeper 
down  into  the  nature  of  this  strange  phenomenon,  to 
guard  against  its  melting  away  from  before  me  when  I 
got  back  to  Europe.  And  at  last,  one  day,  I  really 
thought  I  had  found  the  clue. 

My  wife  and  I  had  been  invited  to  luncheon  with  a 
cultured  and  clever  author,  who  knew  three  languages, 


136  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

had  received  an  extensive  and  liberal  education, 
and  lived  by  her  pen,  writing  for  newspapers,  translat- 
ing, and  giving  lessons .  She  belonged,  in  fact,  to  what 
one  might  call  the  intellectual  middle  class.  She  lived 
with  a  sister  in  a  street  of  old  New  York,  occupying  a 
little  fiat  of  the  kind  in  which  many  middle-class  New 
Yorkers  live.  One  reached  it  by  a  little  wooden  stair- 
case, and  entered  it  by  a  little  door,  opening  on  to  a 
little  corridor,  which  gave  access  to  four  tiny  rooms, 
whose  floors  creaked  under  foot  and  whose  walls  let  the 
voices  and  noises  of  the  neighbours  and  co-lodgers  be 
clearly  heard.  Outside  the  windows  and  extending  to 
the  court-yard,  the  fire-escapes  reminded  one  that  the 
house,  partly  constructed  of  wood,  might  at  any  mo- 
ment catch  fire  like  a  match.  Naturally  there  were  no 
servants  in  the  house.  With  her  sister's  help  the 
charming  author,  when  she  returned  home,  laid 
down  the  pen  and  became  cook  and  chambermaid. 
The  luncheon,  considered  from  an  artistic  point  of 
view,  gave  us  clearly  to  understand,  that  the  hands 
which  had  prepared  it  did  not  possess  any  very  con- 
siderable technical  skill.  That  did  not  prevent  us, 
however,  from  enjoying  ourselves  mightily,  so  interest- 
ing and  pleasant  was  the  company. 

Now,  while  I  was  eating  my  luncheon,  and  looking 
round  me,  I  thought  that  America  must  certainly  be 
much  wealthier  than  the  wealthiest  of  European  coun- 
tries. A  woman  as  richly  endowed  with  intellect  and 
culture  as  my  kind  hostess,  who  lived  by  her  pen  in 


The  American  Definition  of  Progress  137 

Paris,  Rome,  or  London,  would  certainly  earn  less  than 
she.  And  yet  the  foreign  woman  could  live  in  better 
style,  keep  a  servant  to  relieve  her  of  the  most  trouble- 
some and  humble  of  her  domestic  duties,  live  in  a  large 
and  less  inflammable  house,  and  have  fresher  and 
better  prepared  food  to  eat.  If  she  married  a  man  of 
her  own  station,  she  could  more  easily  and  with  less 
stint,  bring  into  the  world,  rear,  and  educate  a  family. 
From  my  hostess,  I  passed  on  to  think  of  all  the 
other  persons  of  the  same  station  in  life,  of  those 
middle  classes  which  are  everywhere  the  support  and 
foundation  of  democratic  institutions  and  the  great 
reserve  of  energy  of  modern  civilisation.  In  New  York, 
Boston,  and  Philadelphia,  the  great  cities  of  the  East, 
I  had  seen  several  famihcs  belonging  to  this  class.  I 
had  even  been  the  recipient  of  their  confidences  and 
complaints.  At  that  moment,  I  realised  clearly  how 
much  more  difficult  and  laborious,  owing  to  the  greater 
cost  of  food  and  lodging,  the  extreme  difficulty  of  find- 
ing servants,  and  the  enormous  expense  of  rearing,  and 
still  more  of  educating,  children  must  be  the  life 
of  those  middle  classes  in  the  great  cities  of  the  United 
States  than  in  the  great  cities  of  Europe.  Like  my 
hostess,  a  business  clerk,  a  humble  employe,  or  an 
artisan  in  the  most  select  industries,  though  he  gains  less 
in  Paris  or  in  London  than  in  New  York,  can  live  much 
better  in  the  former  towns.  He  can  cat  better,  lodge 
more  comfortably,  employ  someone  to  hcl])  in  the  house- 
hold, and  rear  his  family  without  excessive  drudgery. 


138  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Then  I  asked  myself:  "But  what  is  the  use  of  wealth, 
then,  if  it  is  not  a  means  of  living  better,  of  securing 
some  extra  ease,  comfort,  or  pleasure?  What  is  the 
reason  for  this  startling  paradox,  of  riches  turning 
from  a  blessing  into  a  torment?  How  comes  it  that 
America,  which  has  shown  such  energy  in  the  exploi- 
tation of  the  immense  wealth  hidden  in  her  boundless 
territory,  has  not  followed  up  her  conquests  by  con- 
verting these  riches  to  the  benefit  of  the  whole  popula- 
tion? How  is  it  that,  in  this  fortunate  country,  it  is 
these  middle  classes  who  suffer  most  who  yet  have  an 
influence  on  the  Government  such  as  they  have  in  no 
European  country?  Why  can  we  find  in  poorer 
countries  individuals  and  classes  who  are  happier 
because  they  are  better  satisfied  with  their  condition?" 

It  was  by  reflecting  on  this  problem  that  I  at  last 
arrived  at  a  comprehension  of  the  real  nature  of 
American  progress,  and  that  I  finally  lighted  on  the 
subject,  the  frame,  and  the  key  of  the  dialogue  over 
which  I  had  so  long  worried.  How  and  in  what  way,  I 
shall  recount  in  the  following  chapter. 


II 


FACTS  AND  MOTIVES  IN  THE  MODERN  WORLD 

T  IKE  ever}'  other  European,  I  had  gone  to  North 
-'-^  America  with  the  fixed  idea  that  it  was  the 
countr}"  of  the  practical  spirit  par  excellence,  and  that 
the  Americans  were  all  men  who  did  not  lose  them- 
selves in  dreams,  but  lived  in  reality,  intent  on  shaping 
it  to  their  own  ends,  and  acquiring  by  the  most  rapid 
means  the  tangible  and  sure  blessings  of  life — riches, 
prosperity,  power,  and  the  mastery  over  nature.  I 
was  convinced  that  they  knew  better  than  anyone  else 
the  art  of  increasing  the  comforts,  and  diminishing  the 
difficulties,  of  life  by  the  intelligent  use  of  the  means 
furnished  by  nature,  fortune,  and  preceding  generations. 
I  expected,  therefore,  to  find  in  America,  many  facts 
and  few  ideas;  an  intelligent  and  vigorous  egoism 
omnipresent;  scanty  traces  of  idealism,  and  but  little 
faith  in  the  transcendent  principles  which  so  often  lead 
dreamers — individuals  and  nations — to  toil  and  fight 
for  fair  but  unreal  chmieras,  in  the  vain  hope  of  distant 
glory  or  grandeur. 

So  my  first  surprise,  and  a  very  great  one  it  was, 

139 


140  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

arose  from  my  examination  at  close  quarters,  of  the 
policy  pursued  by  the  United  States  in  dealing  with  the 
immense  herds  of  immigrants,  who  yearly  pour  into 
their  harbours  from  all  parts  of  the  Old  World.  In 
South  America,  I  had  closely  observed  the  cautious 
prudence  and  really  practical  sagacity  with  which  the 
republics  try  to  prevent  the  continual  immigration  of 
foreigners  from  disturbing  too  profoundly  the  political 
balance  of  the  State,  by  reserving  the  government  to 
small  oligarchies  bom  and  educated  in  the  country, 
and  therefore  capable  of  directing  public  affairs  with 
a  certain  continuity  of  projects  and  of  national  spirit. 
This  policy  of  the  South  American  republics  is,  I  know> 
severely  criticised  in  Europe,  and  especially  in  Italy, 
by  too  many  persons  who  judge  the  affairs  of  the  New 
World  by  the  standard  of  the  ideas  of  the  Old.  But  to 
a  historian  of  Rome,  like  myself,  to  whom  history  has 
taught  the  great  internal  difficulties  which  were  caused 
in  every  ancient  state  by  the  ^sTotxot  or  peregrini, 
this  policy  seemed  practical  and  reasonable,  at  least 
if  it  be  granted  that  the  principal  task  of  every  state 
is  that  of  solving  in  the  best  possible  way  the  problems 
of  the  hour  and  leaving  to  the  future  its  own  problems. 
To  grant  every  year  citizenship  in  a  new  state  to  a 
great  number  of  men  born  and  educated  in  distant 
lands,  who  come  stuffed  with  ideas  and  tendencies, 
opinions  which  correspond  in  no  wise  with  the  utterly 
different  situation  they  find  in  the  new  country ;  to  give 
them  political  rights  which  they  do  not  want  or  give  a 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  141 

thought  to;  to  make  them,  almost  by  force,  the  pillars 
of  a  political  constitution  which  they  generally  do  not 
understand;  to  hope  to  transform  them  in  a  flash  from 
subjects  of  ancient  European  monarchies  into  citizens 
of  young  American  republics — is  not  all  this  to  do 
violence  to  the  practical  ideas  of  government,  and  to 
multiply  the  already  great  difficulties  among  v/hich 
every  representative  regime  works,  without  any  com- 
pensating advantage,  not  even  that  of  planting  the 
immigrants  firmly  in  the  new  country?  The  vast 
multitudes  which  are  to-day  crossing  from  Europe  to 
America  no  longer  go,  as  they  did  once,  in  search  of 
liberty  beyond  the  ocean.  They  go  in  search  of  higher 
salaries,  an  easier  and  larger  existence,  and  greater 
probability  of  bettering  themselves.  To  open  to  the 
children  of  immigrants  on  the  same  terms  as  to  home- 
born  children  the  high  schools,  the  professions,  and  the 
public  offices — in  short,  all  the  roads  by  which  the  son 
of  a  peasant  or  artisan  can  climb  to  the  higher  bourgeoi- 
sie— is  a  surer  means  of  planting  firmly  in  the  country 
the  crowds  carried  to  America  on  the  wave  of  emigra- 
tion than  the  concession  to  them  of  electoral  rights. 
And  that  is  just  what  the  states  of  South  America, 
with  their  practical  spirit,  have  done  and  are  doing. 

With  tliese  impressions  and  opinions,  I  arrived  from 
South  America  in  the  America  which  symbolises  in  the 
eyes  of  the  world  the  practical  spirit.  And  in  this 
Amcica,  to  m}^  no  small  surprise,  I  found  the  opposite 
policy  to  this  in  actual  operation,  with  all  the  effects 


142  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

which  I  imagined  must  follow  it;  in  particular,  the 
growing  difficulty  of  making  democratic  institutions 
work  smoothly,  with  an  electoral  body  so  swollen,  so 
enormous,  and  so  varied  and  heterogeneous.  I  often 
had  occasion,  when  speaking  or  writing  in  the  United 
States,  to  remember  that  the  cosmopolitan  electoral 
body  which  is  the  base  of  the  democracy  of  the  United 
States  recalls  that  of  Rome,  where  the  freedmen — the 
immigrants  of  the  time — became  citizens,  and  were 
inscribed  in  the  electoral  lists,  whatever  their  national 
origin,  and  even  if  they  were  all  foreigners,  barbarians 
some  of  them,  uncivilised  the  rest.  Nevertheless,  there 
is  between  the  United  States  and  Ancient  Rome  one 
essential  difference;  and  that  is,  that  in  the  Roman 
Republic,  the  electoral  operations  were  concentrated  in 
the  capital,  so  that  the  number  of  persons  who  took  part 
in  them,  the  really  active  electoral  body,  was  extremely 
small;  while  in  the  United  States,  the  electors  are 
numbered  by  millions,  and  are  scattered  over  a  conti- 
nent. Do  not  most  of  the  difficulties  and  incon- 
veniences of  which  I  have  heard  America  complain  in 
connection  with  its  internal  politics  arise  from  the 
enormous  size  of  the  electoral  body  and  from  its 
heterogeneity?  For  both  of  these  are  unique  pheno- 
mena in  the  history  of  the  world,  as  until  now  every 
democracy  has  governed  small,  and  often  the  tiniest 
of,  states.  So  this  experiment,  which  America  is  mak- 
ing, without  being  compelled  to  do  so  by  any  historical 
necessity,  is  a  new  and  bold  one,  the  final  result  of 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  143 

which  it  is  difficult  to  foretell.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  ancient  national  oligarchies,  which  governed  North 
America,  for  so  many  years  after  it  had  gained  its 
independence,  did  not  open  the  doors  of  the  constitu- 
tion to  the  immigrant  multitudes  who  threatened,  if 
admitted,  to  swamp  them.  It  would  have  been  easy  to 
keep  at  least  the  first  Europe-bom  generation  out  of 
politics,  because — as  I  have  already  said — the  greater 
number  of  immigrants  arrive  in  America  without  the 
vaguest  idea,  much  less  ambition,  of  obtaining  what, 
in  a  democracy,  are  the  political  rights  of  a  citizen, 
and  only  want  big  salaries. 

How,  then,  has  the  United  States  come  to  this 
pass?  Certainly  historical  accidents  have  contributed 
to  set  the  Union  in  this  direction.  Historical  accidents 
would,  however,  not  have  sufficed,  if  they  had  not  been 
helped  by  that  conception  of  democracy,  not  practical 
but  mystical,  so  to  speak,  which  I  have  found  obtains 
among  so  many  Americans.  The  rights  of  the  people 
are  not  in  America  a  political  doctrine,  to  be  employed 
by  the  nation  and  its  governors  in  compassing  certain 
ends  of  general  utility,  and  to  be  applied  only  in  the 
measure  and  with  the  limitations  and  cjualifications 
which  make  it  fruitful  of  good  results  and  prevent  it 
from  giving  rise  to  inconveniences.  It  is  a  transcendent 
principle,  an  article  of  faith,  as  it  were,  to  be  applied 
and  developed  without  too  much  regard  to  the  im- 
mediate consequences,  which  must  be  endured  with 
patience  if  they  are  for   the  moment  unpleasant   or 


144  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

dangerous,  in  the  conviction  that  the  principle,  being 
just  and  true,  must  finally  produce  beneficial  effects. 

So,  little  by  little,  I  was  led  to  ask  myself  whether 
by  chance,  in  politics  at  any  rate,  the  South  Americans 
and  the  Europeans  were  not  more  practical  than  the 
North  Americans,  and  whether  the  North  Americans, 
on  the  other  hand,  were  not  great  idealists;  at  least,  if 
by  the  practical  spirit  is  understood  the  art  of  solving 
present  difficulties  by  the  quickest  and  simplest  de- 
vices with  only  an  immediately  realisable  benefit  in 
view,  instead  of  multiplying  difficulties  with  future 
benefits  in  view  or  for  love  of  an  idea  or  a  principle. 
The  amazement  and  uncertainty  caused  by  this  pre- 
liminary survey  of  the  very  foundations  of  the  Ameri- 
can constitution  were  increased,  however,  by  my 
subsequent  observation  of  the  numberless  philanthropic 
works,  educational  institutions,  intellectual,  political, 
or  social  foundations  which  owe  their  existence  to  the 
inexhaustible  generosity  of  the  American  upper  classes. 
For  though  Europeans  may  think  that  every  American 
thinks  only  of  making  money,  a  few  weeks  of  tra,vel 
and  of  observation  were  enough  to  convince  me  that 
America  is  quite  as  richly,  perhaps  more  richly  en- 
dowed than  Europe  with  wealthy  men  whose  only 
thought  it  is  to  spend  their  money  for  the  good  of  their 
fellows,  for  the  progress  of  the  nation,  in  a  word,  for 
objects  of  public  utility. 

However,  though  American  i)hilanthropic  works  may 
equal  and  often  exceed  those  of  Europe  in  number  and 


Facts  and  Alotivcs  in  Modern  World  145 

in  value,  I  have  often  had  occasion  to  notice  one 
difference  between  those  of  the  two  continents:  and 
that  is,  that  the  American  works  are  not  unusually 
inspired  by  a  more  intense,  I  might  almost  say  a  more 
ingenuous  faith  in  the  power  of  man  over  the  miseries 
and  difficulties  of  life.  The  American  often  addresses 
himself  with  fervour,  energy,  and  great  intellectual  and 
pecuniary  effort  to  the  eradication  of  ills  which  the 
European  regards  as  incurable  and  irresponsive  to 
treatment.  And  this  American  faith  in  the  power  to 
rectify,  revive,  and  purify  nature  often  struck  me,  no 
less  than  many  other  Europeans,  as  fringing  on  the 
chimerical.  In  short,  even  in  what  are  called  social 
works,  the  American  often  seemed  to  me  more  idealist, 
more  of  a  dreamer,  and  less  practical  than  the  European ; 
more  ready,  that  is  to  say,  to  venture  on  a  struggle 
against  the  innumerable  ills  of  life  without  being  quite 
sure  of  possessing  adequate  means  for  conquering  them, 
at  the  summons  of  a  mystical  faith  in  the  progress  of 
the  world. 

As  the  result  of  all  my  observations,  I  kept  asking 
myself  whether  by  chance  the  United  States,  notwith- 
standing their  great  practical  activity,  might  not  be  a 
much  more  mystical,  idealistic,  and  visionary  people 
than  the  European  gives  them  credit  for.  But  I  did 
not  dare  answer  the  question  with  a  resolute  Yes  or  No. 
I  could  not  answer  No,  because  that  would  have  in- 
volved ignoring  facts  which  were  daily  obtruding  them- 
selves on  my  notice.     On  the  other  hand,  I  dared  not 


146  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

answer  Yes,  because  I  was  afraid  of  being  accused  of 
excessive  fondness  for  paradoxes,  and  of  wishing  to  do 
violence  to  current  opinions  at  every  opportunity  and 
at  all  costs.  So  I  went  groping  around  for  a  truth 
which  so  far  I  conjectured  rather  than  saw. 

I  had  reached  this  point  in  my  reflections  and  ob- 
servations when  I  was  invited  to  luncheon  by  our 
friend  the  author  and  journalist  whom  I  have  men- 
tioned in  the  preceding  chapter.  When  I  saw  her 
home  and  mode  of  life,  I  could  not  help  asking  myself: 
For  what  reason  is  the  general  standard  of  wealth 
higher,  while  that  of  living  is  no  higher,  in  America  than 
in  Europe?  Why  are  dwellings  in  the  great  American 
cities  so  small,  the  distances  so  great,  the  communica- 
tions so  difficult,  provisions  so  dear,  that  notwith- 
standing the  vast  riches  of  the  country,  life  is  for  the 
masses  and  the  middle  classes  more  expensive  and 
difficult  than  in  many  much  less  wealthy  cities  of 
Europe?  The  primary  answer  was  not  difficult:  Be- 
cause the  cities  have  become  too  big  and  populous, 
because  their  growth  has  been  too  rapid  in  comparison 
with  the  progress  of  agriculture,  and  because  a  section 
at  least  of  their  inhabitants  has  contracted  too  expen- 
sive habits  and  is  accustomed  to  a  life  of  too  great 
luxury.  This  primary  answer,  however,  gave  rise  to  a 
second  question :  Why  have  the  cities  grown  so  rapidly, 
and  with  the  cities  the  luxury  of  every  class?  This  too 
was  easily  explained:  Because  of  the  rapid  development 
of  industries.     America  is  a  vast  continent  of  great 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  147 

natural  wealth,  where  capital  accumulates  rapidly. 
Owing  to  her  ability  to  accumulate  capital  readily,  and 
to  find  work  for  the  numberless  hands  which  the  over- 
crowded districts  of  Europe  have  been  supplying  for 
the  last  hundred  years  to  those  American  countries 
which  have  need  of  them,  America  has  been  able,  not 
only  to  extend  her  agriculture  rapidly  and  to  exploit  her 
mines,  but  also,  and  in  particular,  to  multiply  her 
industries  to  the  point  of  packing  her  larger  cities  with 
so  dense  a  crowd  of  inhabitants  that  life  has  become 
difficult  for  the  majority  of  the  town  populations. 

At  this  point,  however,  one  conclusion  seemed  to 
emerge  from  the  preceding  observations.  Suppose 
North  America,  instead  of  employing  all  the  capital 
at  her  disposal  in  her  many  industries,  as  well  as  the 
capital  borrowed  from  European  countries  poorer  than 
herself,  had  done  as  France  is  doing  in  Europe,  namely, 
had  invested  part  of  her  capital  in  foreign  countries,  in 
loans  to  governments,  cities,  railways,  industries, 
trades,  and  agricultural  enterprises,  what  would  have 
happened?  The  demand  for  labour  would  doubtless 
have  been  less  in  America,  and  therefore  the  emigration 
to  it  would  not  have  been  so  startling.  Her  industries 
would  have  developed  less,  and  her  cities  would  not 
have  increased  so  rapidly.  The  United  States  would 
now  have  a  smaller  population  to  support,  and  one 
better  distributed  between  the  cities  and  the  country; 
would  have  fewer  cities,  and  those  smaller.  The  band 
of  fortunates  who  have  made  hu</e  wealth  out  of  the 


148  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

rapid  and  prodigious  development  of  the  cities  would 
be  smaller,  but  the  middle  and  lower  classes  would 
enjoy  a  more  comfortable  and  easier  existence.  Their 
condition  would  resemble  much  more  closely  that  of 
the  middle  and  lower  classes  in  Europe.  They  would 
earn  lower  wages,  but  those  wages,  though  numerically 
less,  would  procure  them  greater  comforts  and  pleasures. 
It  was  now  that,  after  my  many  discussions  with 
others,  and  my  extended  solitary  meditation  on  the 
difficult  problem,  I  thought  that  I  had  finally  confuted 
the  troublesome  doctrine  of  American  progress.  What 
is  that  progress  of  which  the  Americans  are  so  proud 
but  the  unbridled  rush  of  enterprise  which  has  so 
rapidly  multiplied  the  industries,  enlarged  the  cities, 
and  increased  the  population  and  wealth  of  the  United 
States?  But  in  that  case  it  was  clear  that  American 
progress  contradicted  itself.  By  inciting  the  American 
people  to  gather  together  capital  and  workers,  to  open 
their  gates  to  millions  of  European  emigrants,  to  invest 
their  gains  in  new  enterprises  or  in  the  enlargement  of 
old  enterprises,  to  redouble  and  multiply  in  every 
direction  efforts  and  enterprises,  so  as  to  form  of  them 
a  mountain  with  which  to  scale  the  heavens,  the  spirit 
of  progress  had  created  in  America  an  opulence  which 
teemed  with  difficulties,  contradictions,  and  embarrass- 
ments, and  which  meant  for  a  large  part  of  the  popula- 
tion a  condition  somewhat  resembling  that  of  King 
Midas:  seeing  riches  all  round  him,  and  not  being  able 
to  enjoy  them.    But  to  produce  riches  with  no  prospect 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  149 

of  enjoying  them  is  an  absurdit}'.  Much  wiser,  there- 
fore, was  old  Europe,  which,  taught  Ijy  the  experience 
of  centuries,  refused  to  let  herself  be  dazzled  by  this 
idea  of  progress,  and  instead  of  heaping  up  riches  at 
top  speed  as  does  the  New  World,  was  more  careful  in 
her  choice  of  new  riches  to  create  so  that  she  might 
enjoy  them;  so  that  she  might  make  of  them  a  fount 
of  well-being,  not  a  cause  of  difficulty  for  mankind. 

This  was  the  moment  at  which  I  was  inclined  to 
think  that  all  the  ideas  of  America  and  the  optimistic 
spirit  which  animates  them,  beginning  with  the  idea  of 
progress,  could  only  be  a  passing  ebullition  and  the 
merry  madness  of  youth.  This  nation,  I  said  to  myself, 
favoured  as  it  is  at  the  mom.ent  by  unusual  facilities 
for  the  creation  of  wealth,  has  been  so  much  carried 
away  by  its  success  as  to  make  of  riches,  which  are  and 
can  be  only  a  means,  an  end  in  themselves.  A  longer 
experience  of  history  will  convince  America  of  its 
mistake.  One  day,  however,  as  I  was  again  pondering 
intently  over  the  facts  I  had  observed,  which  seemed 
to  prove  that  the  Americans  were  often  dreamers, 
idealists,  almost  m\-stics  in  matters  in  which  the  Euro- 
peans show  themselves  eminently  practical,  an  idea 
flashed  across  my  mind.  What  if  American  progress, 
which  to  me  had  seemed  up  to  then  to  be  but  a  youthful 
madness,  should  prove,  if  thoroughly  analysed,  to  be 
only  an  idealistic  and  semi-mystical  conception  of 
wealth  itself?  What  if  this  nation,  accused  of  desiring 
only  the  immediate  possession  of  worldly  goods,  was 


150  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

wearing  itself  out  in  an  unbridled  and  diabolical  activ- 
ity from  dawn  till  sundown,  not  with  the  object  of 
increasing  its  happiness  and  pleasure,  but  for  a  distant 
end,  transcending  the  egoism  and  even  the  conscious- 
ness of  the  individual?  What  if  all,  without  knowing  it, 
or  impelled  as  it  were  by  a  superior,  if  not  directly 
mystical  force,  were  labouring  and  even  suffering  for 
this  end — a  new  end,  to  which  history  can  show  us  no 
parallel;  the  conquest  of  an  immense  continent  from 
one  sea  to  the  other,  by  means  of  a  new  instrument 
unknown  to  our  forefathers:  steam-  or  electricity- 
driven  machinery? 

From  progress,  from  the  democratic  and  philan- 
thropic ideality  of  the  Americans,  from  the  economic 
difficulties  with  which  our  kind  hostess  had  to  wrestle, 
to  machinery  and  to  the  conquest  of  the  great  territory 
of  the  United  States,  may  seem  a  risky,  violent,  and 
unexpected  transition  or  transitions.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  I  could  not  have  executed  so  bold  a  transition 
unaided.  I  was  helped  by  my  wife,  in  an  indirect,  but, 
for  that  very  reason,  strange  and  decisive  way.  In 
fact,  without  her  help  I  should  not  have  succeeded  in 
finding  my  bearings  in  the  chaos  of  my  American  ex- 
periences, nor  in  understanding  how  and  to  what  extent 
the  Old.  World  and  the  New  World  are  opposed  to  each 
other;  as  a  result,  I  could  not  have  written  the  philo- 
sophical dialogue  on  Europe  and  America,  which  will 
be  published  shortly.     It  seems  to  me  necessary,  then, 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  151 

to  recount  how  this  help  was  given  me;  and  I  hope  that 
my  brief  account  will  not  be  read  without  interest. 

Several  years  before  we  embarked  on  our  journeys 
to  the  two  Americas,  my  wife  had  begun  a  long  and 
deep  study  of  modern  machinery  and  of  the  great 
mechanical  industry.  Though  a  daughter  of  Ccsare 
Lombroso,  who  was  a  great  inventor,  she  is  tempera- 
mentally inclined  to  the  ancient  more  than  to  the  new, 
and  therefore  little  disposed  by  nature  to  admire  the 
gigantic  disorder  of  modern  society  which  other  minds 
find  so  intoxicating.  Her  Innate  antipathy  to  the 
civilisation  of  steam  and  electricity  had  been  in- 
creased a  thousandfold  by  observation  of  the  profound 
perturbation  which  the  great  mechanical  Industry  has 
caused  in  a  country  of  ancient  civilisation  like  Italy, 
densely  populated  and  living  on  the  resources  of  a 
small  territory  devoid  of  great  natural  riches.  But 
when  she  at  last  made  of  machinery  an  object  of 
methodical  study,  her  researclics  and  the  evidence  she 
had  patiently  accumulated  transformed  this  antipathy 
into  a  complex  and  bold  theory,  the  cardinal  idea  of 
which  I  think  I  can  express  as  follows.  Machinery 
produces  only  apparent  wealth  and  prosperity,  be- 
cause instead  of  diminishing  the  effort  necessar}^  to 
produce  the  things  we  need,  and  therefore  their  price, 
in  reality  it  increases  it.  The  mechanical  industry 
demands  immense  capital  to  construct  the  machines 
and  set  them  going;  immense  quantities  of  raw  material 
to  keep  the  machinery  always  busy;  the  concentration 


152  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  the  industry  in  places  where  combustibles  or  the 
motive  forces  abound;  consequently  an  enormous  de- 
velopment in  the  means  of  communication,  for  the 
exchange  of  products  and  raw  materials,  and  a  dense 
population  accustomed  to  produce  and  consume  as 
much  as  possible.  Therefore,  the  civilisation  of  steam- 
er electricity-driven  machines  cannot  develop  with- 
out rapidly  exhausting  nature,  so  to  speak — mines,  or 
forests,  or  the  fertility  of  the  soil.  That  explains  why  it 
flourishes  chiefly  in  vast  and  naturally  wealthy  terri- 
tories, which  it  rapidly  exploits  and  impoverishes. 
Indeed,  it  explains  why  it  is  always  seeking  for  new, 
rich  territories,  seeking  to  penetrate  unexplored  conti- 
nents, like  Africa,  as  soon  as  it  has  conquered  America. 
Nor  is  it  difficult  to  understand  why  nations  which  live 
in  countries  of  limited  natural  resources  get  more  harm 
than  good,  and  often  become  involved  in  vexatious 
crises,  from  the  introduction  of  mechanical  civilisation. 
It  is  clear,  too,  how  that  civilisation  must  result  in 
making  life  ever  more  and  more  expensive,  and  there- 
fore forcing  men  to  despoil  the  earth  and  to  work  ever 
harder,  without  ever  attaining  to  satisfaction. 

These  ideas  were  the  subject  of  long  and  lively  dis- 
cussions between  my  wife,  her  father,  and  myself. 
These  discussions,  as  was  natural  with  discussions  arising 
out  of  a  doctrine  which  was  maturing  in  the  mind  of  a 
patient  seeker  after  truth,  were,  so  to  speak,  eccentric; 
they  revolved  now  round  one  point,  now  round  another. 
Nevertheless,  the  central  point  round  which  they  ulti- 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  153 

mately  revolved  was  this:  whether  the  wealth  for  which 
man  has  to  thank  machinery  is  real  or  apparent.  I 
said  that,  since  machinery  produces  much  and  at  great 
speed,  there  seemed  to  me  no  room  for  doubt  that  it 
increased  the  sum  of  benefits  at  man's  disposal,  and 
therefore  enriched  the  world.  My  wife  replied  that  if 
machinery  produces  much,  it  also  consumes  enormously, 
more  indeed  than  it  produces,  so  that  a  mechanical 
civilisation  must  always  feel  itself  tormented  by  the 
necessity  of  having  more  than  it  possesses,  and,  there- 
fore, must  be  always  in  a  state  of  indigence.  So  the 
discussions  went  on,  lively  and  long,  without  either 
of  the  parties  convincing  the  other;  and  at  last  I  came 
to  the  conclusion  that  our  amour  pro  pre  must  be  making 
us  persist  in  the  sophistical  discussion  of  an  unreal 
question. 

When  I  got  to  America,  however,  I  saw  that  the 
question  we  were  discussing  was  anything  but  unreal; 
for  it  was  these  ideas  and  discussions  which  enabled  me 
to  collate  our  friend's  economic  difficulties  with  the 
mystical  s})irit  which  pervades  so  large  a  part  of 
American  life,  and  to  understand  the  nature  of  Ameri- 
can progress.  Were  not  the  economic  difficulties  en- 
countered especially  in  the  big  cities,  notwithstanding 
the  imm.cnsc  wealth  of  the  country,  by  the  most 
numerous  classes  of  America,  the  decisive  proof  that 
really,  as  my  wife  asserted,  the  wealth  created  by  a 
mechanical  civilisation  is  to  some  extent  onh^  apparent? 
That  notwithstanding  the  great  depredation  of  nature 


154  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

carried  out  with  means  furnished  by  science,  men's 
needs  increase  faster  than  their  riches;  therefore  that 
mechanical  civiHsation  revolves  in  the  vicious  circle 
of  an  insoluble  contradiction?  All  the  same,  if  America 
had  set  herself  with  less  eagerness  to  exploit  by  means 
of  machinery  her  immense  natural  resources ;  if  she  had 
not  welcomed  so  many  millions  of  men  from  all  parts 
of  the  world;  if  she  had  not  invested  in  machinery  and 
industries  and  railways  such  a  vast  amount  of  capital, 
without  a  doubt  we  should  find  a  smaller  number  of 
people  living,  and  living  more  comfortably,  in  America 
to-day;  but  the  conquest  of  the  vast  continent  would 
not  have  reached  its  present  pitch,  and  the  world 
would  not  have  witnessed  that  unparalleled  event  in  its 
history,  the  bewildering  development  of  the  United 
States. 

In  fact,  we  must  not  forget,  if  we  wish  to  realise  what 
a  miracle  the  civilisation  of  machinery  has  succeeded 
in  accomplishing  in  the  New  World,  how  slow  and 
difficult  was  the  expansion  of  mankind  over  the  world 
up  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  that  is, 
during  a  period  when  men  worked  with  their  hands  and 
travelled  over  their  planet  on  their  own  legs,  or  on 
those  of  animals  little  swifter  than  themselves.  The 
great  plains  acted  as  so  many  great  barriers  in  the 
way  of  men's  occupation  of  the  land,  because  men  lost 
their  way  in  them.  Consequently  men  tended  to 
settle  on  little  tracts  of  land,  in  such  a  way  as  to  be 
near   one  another,  to  be  able   to  communicate  easily 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  155 

with  one  another,  and  to  exchange  their  products. 
Everybody  knows  how  slow  has  been  in  Europe  the 
advance  of  civiHsation  from  south  to  north;  how  many 
centuries  were  required  for  the  passage  of  the  Alps  and 
expansion  into  Gaul,  how  many  for  the  crossing  of  the 
Rhine  and  extension  as  far  as  the  Elbe,  and  again  for 
the  passage  of  the  Elbe  and  the  advance  towards  the 
Vistula  and  the  great  plains  of  Eastern  Europe.  In 
America  itself^n  the  South  as  well  as  in  the  North — 
up  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  progress  of 
population  and  civilisation  was  very  slow  and  difhcult. 
In  the  twentieth  century,  on  the  other  hand,  a 
prodigy  occurred,  thanks  to  steam-engines  and  all  the 
other  machines  of  which  the  steam-engine  is  the  parent. 
With  these  machines,  men  can  exploit  more  rapidly  and 
thoroughly  all  the  wealth  of  the  earth,  and  with  the  rail- 
ways can  export  the  wealth  produced,  even  from  the  most 
remote  and  buried  regions,  which  thus  can  be  peopled 
and  exploited.  Civilisation,  following  the  railway-lines, 
and  armed  with  fire  and  machines,  in  little  more  than 
fifty  years  extended  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific, 
crossing  and  occupying,  however  summarily,  the  im- 
mense territories  of  the  interior,  and  binding  together 
with  a  network  of  communications  and  interests, 
cities,  climates,  and  territories  without  number  from 
east  to  west,  from  north  to  south.  But  machinery  is 
an  inanimate  instrument,  only  to  be  imbued  with 
creative  force  by  the  thought  and  will  of  man.  In 
consequence,  this  miracle  of  history  would  not  have 


156  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

come  about  if  a  bold  and  energetic  people  had  not 
multiplied  machines  with  extraordinary  rapidity  over 
the  whole  immensity  of  their  territory;  if  they  had  not 
subordinated  to  this  supreme  end  every  other  good, 
aesthetic  beauty,  the  preservation  of  traditions,  the 
purity  of  the  national  spirit,  and  even  the  conveniences 
of  life  which  wealth  can  give.  American  progress  is 
then  a  transcendent  and  mystical  idea  which  inflames 
America  with  passion  and  impels  it  to  accomplish  the 
new  and  rapid  conquest  of  its  own  territory.  And  logic 
wastes  its  time  looking  for  and  laying  bare  contradic- 
tions in  it  savouring  of  the  absurd.  Doubtless,  to  work 
with  frenzied  zeal  at  creating  riches  in  order  to  be 
unable  to  enjoy  them  is  an  absurdity  if  judged  in  the 
light  of  the  interest  of  each  individual;  but  are  not  all 
ideals  absurd,  when  judged  in  the  light  of  the  interest  of 
the  individual?  What  does  it  matter  to  the  soldier  who 
dies  in  battle  that  his  country  emerges  victorious  from 
the  conflict  in  which  it  is  engaged,  seeing  that  he  will 
not  be  able  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  the  victory?  From  the 
point  of  view  of  personal  interest,  it  is  better  to  live  in 
a  country  disgraced  and  diminished  by  a  defeat  than 
to  die  in  a  country  aggrandised  by  a  victory.  So  the 
privations  to  which  I  had  seen  exposed  in  the  intimacy 
of  her  home,  that  kind  hostess  of  ours,  who  had  offered 
us  luncheon  in  her  modest  flat,  no  longer  seemed  an 
absurd  contradiction  of  life.  Her  privations  were 
transfigured  into  a  small  personal  sacrifice  necessary  for 
the  fulfilment  of  a  great  national  work,  transcending 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  157 

the     interest     and    the   wishes    of    every    individual 
American. 

Thus  at  last  I  had  grasped  American  progress  and  its 
apparent  incongruities.  It  was  an  ideal  of  life,  bom  and 
rapidly  matured  in  a  new  continent  during  the  past 
half  century,  at  a  time  when  the  conquest  of  the  vast 
territory  by  means  of  machinery  was  becoming  more 
widespread  and  more  intense.  It  was  the  ideal  of  life 
which,  overshadowing  all  the  others,  had  called  forth 
from  the  depths  of  American  society  the  marvellous 
energy  which  has  staggered  the  world.  When  I  had 
once  found  the  key  to  this  enigma,  many  phenomena 
of  American  life  seemed  to  me  clearer.  I  could  easily 
explain  to  myself  why  the  public  attached  less  weight 
to  politics  on  that  side  than  in  Europe,  and  regarded  the 
defects  and  shortcomings  in  its  political  institutions  with 
an  indifference  which  to  Europeans  seems  strange;  in 
particular,  why  it  preferred  having  them  in  a  condition 
full  of  defects  and  inconveniences  rather  than  any  reform 
which  increased  the  power  of  the  State  and  limited  the 
initiative  of  the  individual.  I  could  explain  also  how  it 
had  succeeded  in  keeping  alive  that  spirit  of  liberty, 
not  in  politics  only,  but  in  religion,  administration, 
customs,  and  culture  which  often  strikes  Europeans  as 
either  excessive  or  bizarre.  The  great  national  work — 
the  conquest  of  the  continent — is  accomplished  much 
more  by  personal  initiative  than  with  the  help  and 
under  the  direction  of  the  State;  the  important  point, 


158  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

therefore,  is  that  personal  energy  should  be  subjected 
in  this  great  work  to  the  smallest  possible  number  of 
limits  and  restrictions. 

Lastly,  I  could  explain  why  in  American  society,  to 
borrow  a  rather  quaint  philosophical  expression,  the 
category  of  quantity  prevails  over  that  of  quality. 
During  my  first  few  weeks  in  America,  I  used  to  smile 
when  I  heard  some  Americans  go  into  ecstasies  at  the 
thought  that  everything  in  America  was  big,  from  the 
country  to  the  cities,  the  factories,  and  the  statistics  of 
population;  when  they  gloated  over  comparisons  be- 
tween their  own  country  and  the  little  countries  of 
Europe,  and  statements  of  the  comparative  superiority 
in  size  of  things  in  their  own  country.  I  no  longer 
smiled,  however,  when  I  realised  what  American  pro- 
gress represented.  A  civilisation,  whose  principal  in- 
strument for  the  accomplishment  of  its  work  and  for 
establishing  itself  in  the  world  is  machinery,  must 
necessarily  consider  the  quantitative  criterion  the  su- 
preme criterion  of  perfection.  In  what  respect,  indeed, 
is  machinery,  regarded  as  an  instrument  of  production, 
superior  to  the  human  hand  ?  Everybody  knows  that  its 
superiority  consists  not  in  quality,  but  in  the  quantity, 
of  its  output.  Machinery  produces  much  and  quickly. 
The  hand  produces  little  and  slowly.  The  hand,  how- 
ever, can  attain  a  standard  of  perfection  which  is 
denied  machinery.  Man  will  never  succeed  in  con- 
structing a  machine  capable  of  sculpturing  the  Venus 
of  Milo  or  of  weaving  the  marvellous  tapestries  which 


Facts  and  Motives  in  Modern  World  159 

we  admire  in  the  museums  of  Europe.  Everything  of  a 
high  degree  of  perfection  is  exclusively  handmade; 
vice  versa,  the  hand,  however,  it  may  strive  and  labour 
and  practise,  will  never  succeed  in  attaining  in  its  work 
the  giddy  rapidity  of  which  steam-  and  electricity- 
driven  machines  are  capable,  or  in  producing  in  so  short 
a  time  so  many  good  things.  Consequently,  in  a 
civilisation  in  w^hich  machinery  predominates,  men  will 
be  continually  making  fresh  efforts  to  live  faster  and 
faster,  and  to  produce  and  consume  more  and  more 
rapidly.  They  will  not  be,  on  the  other  hand,  too 
exacting  on  the  score  of  quality.  They  will  be  content 
with  things  which  look  nice,  without  demanding  ex- 
traordinary excellence  or  finish  in  details.  They  will  be 
better  pleased  to  consume  many  examples  of  products 
of  inferior  durability  than  one  single  example  of  pro- 
ducts of  great  perfection.  Consequently,  vagaries  of 
taste,  continual  movement,  ready  forgetfulness  of  tradi- 
tions, and  abundance  of  mediocrity,  will  be  saHent 
characteristics  of  machine-ruled  civihsation.  The  great 
w^orks  of  art  which  were  the  glory  of  past  regimes 
will  disappear  for  the  present,  which  will  see  them 
replaced  by  objects  of  medium  equality  offered  in  greater 
quantity. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  found  all  these  characteristics 
in  North  America,  and  they  no  longer  oflended  me. 
They  seemed  to  me  necessary  qualities  of  a  society 
which  sets  out  to  conquer  a  boundless  territory  with 
machinery.     Nevertheless,  at  this  point,  having  solved 


i6o  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  American  problem,  I  was  confronted  with  the 
European  problem  under  a  new  aspect.  If  American 
progress,  if  machinery,  if  the  quantitative  criterion  of 
perfection  are  necessary  weapons  for  the  accomplish- 
ment of  the  great  historical  work  to  which  the  United 
States  have  set  themselves,  how  are  we  to  explain  the 
fact  that  in  the  states  of  Europe  also  machines  are 
being  multiplied,  the  American  idea  of  progress  is 
spreading,  and  the  quantitative  criterion  of  perfection 
is  prevailing  gradually?  All  of  them  except  Russia, 
which  in  many  respects  resembles  the  United  States, 
are  countries  of  an  old  civilisation,  live  in  small  tracts 
of  territory,  and  have  not  immense  continents  to  exploit. 
At  this  point  I  saw  hovering  over  Europe  and  America 
a  new,  vaster,  and  more  general  problem,  which  domi- 
nates the  two  worlds  and  bestrides  the  Atlantic  like  a 
great  bridge :  the  struggle  between  quantity  and  quality. 


Ill 

MORE  OR   BETTER? 

TT  is  an  undoubted  fact  that  Europe  is  becoming 
*  Americanised;  that  the  American  idea  of  progress 
• — understood  to  mean  the  increase  of  wealth  and  the 
perfectioning  of  the  instruments  of  production — is  pene- 
trating European  society.  No  profound  knowledge  of 
European  society  is  needed  to  recognise  this.  I  would 
even  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  the  only  idea  which  in  the 
last  fifty  years  has  sunk  dee]3  into  the  minds  of  the 
masses  in  Europe  is  this  American  idea  of  progress. 
I  must,  however,  also  confess  that  before  I  went  to 
America  I  belonged  to  that  group  of  Europeans, 
numerous  enough,  especially  among  the  cultured  and 
ui)pcr  classes,  which  laments  this  "Americanisation" 
of  Europe,  and  considers  it  to  be  a  sort  of  mental 
aljerration  and  decadence  on  the  part  of  the  Old  World. 
The  idea  is  fairly  wide-spread  in  Europe.  It  may 
startle  a  good  many  Americans;  but  it  will  not  seem 
paradoxical  to  those  who  s|)are  a  moment's  reflection 
for  the  history  of  European  civilisation  up  to  the 
French  Revolution. 

II  i6i 


i62  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

There  is  no  doubt  that,  considered  from  the  point  of 
view  of  our  ancient  history,  this  idea  of  progress,  inter- 
preted American-fashion,  is  a  kind  of  revolutionary 
dissolving  force.  Perhaps  the  upheaval  which  it  has 
produced  and  is  producing  in  Europe  can  almost  be 
compared  with  that  which  Christianity  caused  in  the 
ancient  civilisation,  when  it  destroyed  in  the  Greco- 
Latin  world  the  political  and  military  spirit  which  had 
been  the  mainstay  of  that  world.  Indeed,  we  must  not 
forget  that  from  the  dawn  of  history  up  to  the  French 
Revolution  succeeding  generations  had  lived  in  Europe 
contented  with  little,  faithful  to  traditions,  and  holding 
every  innovation  to  be  a  danger  and  every  enterprise 
a  revolt  against  God  and  against  the  memory  of  their 
ancestors.  It  is  true  that  even  in  those  days  men 
usually  preferred  ease  to  poverty  and  were  not  insensi- 
ble to  the  magnetism  of  gold.  Even  then,  each  succeed- 
ing generation  saw  an  increase  in  the  wealth  of  the 
world  and  in  the  spread  of  population  over  the  face  of 
the  earth.  But  how  slow  and  spasmodic  was  the  in- 
crease! Up  to  the  time  of  the  French  Revolution  it  is 
impossible  to  discern  in  history  any  differences  in  wealth 
and  population  at  intervals  of  less  than  a  century.  The 
change  produced  by  each  generation  was  so  small  as  to 
be  barely  recognisable.  In  compensation,  the  men  of 
that  time  strove  to  make  the  world  fairer  and  better. 
Art  and  religion  were  their  absorbing  preoccupation. 

From  Greece  [says  one  of  the  characters  in  my  dialogue], 
which  taught  the  world  to  write  and  to  sculp,  up  to  the 


More  or  Better?  163 

Middle  Aj^es  which  built  the  fairest  cathedrals  and  the 
most  fantastic  palaces  of  all  times;  from  the  Et,^ypt  of 
the  Ptolemies,  from  which  the  last  rays  of  Hellenic  beauty 
illumined  the  Mediterranean  world,  up  to  the  Rome  of  the 
popes  and  up  to  the  \'e:iice  of  ilic  sixteenth  century,  which 
flaunted  her  marljle  pomp  in  the  eyc.^  of  the  world,  uj)  to 
the  France  of  the  ciL^hteenth  century,  which  immortalised 
her  three  sovereii^ns  in  three  world-comj)ellin,L;  decorative 
styles;  from  Au,e;ustus,  who  protected  Horace  and  Viri,'il, 
up  to  Louis  XIV,  who  protected  Racine  and  Molicre,  and 
up  to  the  Marquise  de  Pompadour,  who  strove  to  make 
Paris  the  metropolis  of  elei^ance, — was  not  the  perjjetuation 
of  a  form  of  beauty  the  supreme  ambition  of  every  nation 
and  of  every  state?  Consider  the  countless  efforts  made  to 
establish  in  the  world  the  rci;s'n  either  of  sanctity  or  of 
justice  or  both,  from  ilie  Roman  Empire  which  created 
law,  up  to  Christiaidty  whicli  strove  to  cleanse  human 
nature  of  sin,  and  ui)  to  the  French  Revolution,  which 
proclaimed  to  the  world  the  ajjc  of  liberty,  fraternity,  and 
equality. 

Such  was  that  old  Europe  which  created  the  number- 
less masterpieces  of  architecture,  scidpture,  and 
painting,  now  so  much  admired  by  the  Americans; 
that  old  Europe  which  discovered  iVmcrica,  cre- 
ated science,  and  produced  the  French  Revolution. 
But  what  remains  of  that  old  Europe?  American 
progress  is  busy  to-day  destroying  it;  in  particular, 
the  artistic  s])irit  is  rapidl}-  disap])earing  from  the  con- 
tinent which  for  centuries  was  the  world's  teacher  of 
beauty. 

Do  you  seriously  believe  [asks  another  of  my  characters, 
he  who  in  the  dialoL;uc  defends  America  and  the  new  ideals 


1 64  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  life]  that  it  is  any  use  nowadays  lamenting  the  fact 
that  some  rare  genius  is  unable  at  the  present  day  to  give 
birth  to  his  immortal  masterpiece  in  the  solitude  of  his 
pride?  At  a  time  when  man  is  inventing  increasingly 
powerful  machinery,  and  is  conquering  the  earth,  the  sea, 
the  air,  the  vast  treasures  hidden  in  every  nook  and  cranny 
of  the  universe;  with  these  marvellous  tools  in  his  hand  is 
recognising  that  he  is  becoming  the  wizard  visioned  in 
the  legends  of  centuries;  while  the  masses  are  clamouring 
for  bread,  victuals,  education,  ease,  security,  pleasures, 
air,  light,  liberty,  all  God's  blessings  in  prodigious  and 
yearly-increasing  quantities? 

These  words  are  not  the  vapourings  of  a  fanciful 
individual.  They  are  repeated  a  hundred  times  daily 
in  Europe,  in  a  more  or  less  elegant  form,  for  they 
express  the  kernel  of  the  thought  of  the  Europe  which 
is  being  Americanised.  I  could  quote  many  examples 
in  support  of  my  contention.  I  will  quote  one  only,  a 
characteristic  one.  A  foreigner  may  often  see  in  the 
smaller  Italian  cities  ancient  monuments — churches  or 
palaces — which  are  gradually  falling  into  ruin.  The 
nonchalance  of  the  authorities  or  the  ignorance  and 
stinginess  of  the  proprietors  suffer  time  to  do  its  deadly 
work,  or  even  help  to  accelerate  it  by  befouling  the  last 
relics  of  a  past  beauty.  The  foreigner  shakes  his  head, 
sighs,  mutters  harsh  judgments,  and  asks  himself  sotto 
voce  whether  the  inhabitants  of  that  little  town  are 
barbarians.  His  stupor  would  be  increased,  however, 
if  he  could  speak  with  one  of  the  locals  and  open  his 
mind  freely  to  him.  "We  barbarians?" — would  answer 
the  local  shop-keeper,  lawyer,  doctor,  or  artisan.    To 


More  or  Better?  165 

prove  to  the  foreigner  how  wrong  he  was,  they  would 
tell  him  that  that  little  town  has  actually  got  electric 
light!  The  municipality,  which  cannot  find  a  tew 
thousand  francs  for  keeping  this  or  that  great  monu- 
ment in  a  decent  state,  will  spend  large  sums  on  lighting 
with  electric  light  streets  in  which  after  9  p.m.  there 
is  nobody  to  be  seen.  The  adoption  of  electric  light 
is  an  act  of  progress,  and  nowadays  even  the  shop- 
keeper and  the  artisan  understand  progress  in  this 
American  sense;  while,  with  the  exception  of  a  few 
cultured  and  art-loving  persons,  who  have  no  influence 
whatever,  nobody  ever  thinks  it  a  barbarism  to  allow 
an  old  monument  built  by  our  fathers  to  fall  into 
ruin. 

This  is  a  trifling  instance;  but  it  indicates  the  new 
spirit  which  is  now  pervading  and  conquering  the 
whole  of  Europe.  The  most  evident  proof  of  tliis 
triumph  of  American  progress  is  the  decadence  or  dis- 
appearance of  all  the  schools  of  art.  Euro])e  was  in 
past  centuries,  in  harder  and  more  difficult  times  than 
the  present,  the  glorious  mother  and  mistress  of  civilisa- 
tion, because  under  diverse  forms,  she  managed  to 
create  and  keep  going  schools  of  literature,  sculpture, 
painting,  architecture,  and  music.  To-day,  these  schools 
have  almost  all  disap])eared ;  and  the  few  survivors, 
with  very  few  excej)tions,  are  in  a  state  of  decadence. 
On  the  other  hand,  schools  of  electricity,  dyeing,  weav- 
ing, mechanics,  commerce,  and  c^hemistry  alwund  and 
flourish ;   they   are    the   only   schools   the   masses    now 


i66  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

require.  In  past  centuries,  the  states  and  aristocracies 
of  Europe  had  in  various  ways  protected  and  encour- 
aged the  arts;  and  this  protection  had  been  one  of  the 
principal  reasons  for  their  progress.  Now  this  is  no 
longer  the  case.  The  wealthy  classes  of  Europe  to-day 
consider  it  much  more  dignified  and  elegant  to  build 
motor-cars  and  aeroplanes  than  to  help  painting  and 
sculpture.  As  to  the  states,  if  one  of  them  tries  to 
encourage  some  art,  protests  pour  in  from  every  side 
that  the  expenditure  is  a  wasting  of  the  people's  money 
in  the  most  idiotic  way.  Italy  was  for  centuries  the 
mistress  of  the  world  in  every  art.  Yet  even  in  Italy 
bitter  complaints  are  made  to-day  about  the  few 
millions  which  the  public  bodies  have  spent  in  the  last 
thirty  years  in  raising  monuments  to  the  great  men  of 
the  Revolution.  On  the  other  hand,  how  can  sculpture 
flourish,  if  nobody  will  pay  the  sculptors  for  the  works 
which  they  are  capable  of  executing?  And  for  what 
reason  is  the  State,  which  possesses  ancient  monuments, 
unable  to  spend  another  million  or  two  on  keeping 
alive  the  tradition  of  an  art  which  has  shed  no  little 
glory  on  the  Nation?  Is  not  this  tradition,  too,  a 
national  heirloom?  But  the  first-born  daughter  of 
Beauty  no  longer  understands  these  simple  truths. 
Infected  by  the  spirit  of  American  progress,  she 
protests  that  the  money  spent  on  art  is  wasted; 
she  is  right  willing  that  hundreds  of  millions  be 
spent  on  the  encouragement  of  the  mechanical  and 
iron   industries. 


More  or  Better?  167 

There  is  no  need  to  wonder,  therefore,  if  many  Euro- 
peans regret,  the  Americanisation  of  the  old  continent 
as  a  kind  of  grievous  madness.  Europe — especially  its 
upper  classes — lives  a  great  deal— it  could  hardly 
help  Hving — in  its  past  history.  I  have  already  said, 
that  I,  too,  when  1  undertook  m}^  journeys  to  America, 
was  more  or  less  of  this  same  cast  of  thought.  But  in 
America,  confronted  with  this  frenzy  of  desires  and  of 
works  which  has  attracted  from  all  parts  of  the  world 
and  fused  into  one  people  so  many  millions  of  souls,  has 
created  so  many  cities  and  produced  so  much  wealth, 
it  was  no  longer  possible  for  me  to  shut  my  eyes  to  the 
fact  that  so  vast  and  profound  a  phenomenon  must 
depend  on  causes  much  more  complex  and  grave  than 
a  simple  mistake  or  mental  aberration.  For  what  reason 
was  Europe  ready  to  destroy  even  her  secular  tradition 
of  art  for  the  sake  of  emulating  that  rapidity  of  execu- 
tion and  audacity  of  enterprise  which  I  was  then 
witnessing  in  the  New  World?  This  was  the  problem 
which  presented  itself  to  me,  after  I  had  grasped  the 
meaning  of  American  progress;  and  whicli  I  succeeded 
in  solving  with  the  help  of  my  wife's  investigations  into 
the  history  of  machinery. 

"Christopher  Columbus, "  says  one  of  my  characters, 
in  Between  the  Old  World  and  the  Nnv,  "not  only  t!is- 
covered  America,  but  re-endowed  man  with  the  globe 
which  God  had  already  given  him,  inasmuc-li  as  he 
enabled  man  at  last  to  know  it."  Europe  iiad  re- 
mained content  up  to  the  fifteenth  century  to  live  in  her 


i68  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

little  territory,  ignorant  of  how  great  the  world  was. 
That  earlier  limitation,  however,  only  increased  the 
force  of  the  impulse,  given  to  man  by  the  discovery  of 
America,  to  scour  and  ransack  the  oceans,  with  the 
object  of  discovering  and  possessing  the  whole  plane. 
Between  the  sixteenth  and  the  eighteenth  centuries, 
then,  Europe  saw  the  world  expanding  around  her. 
With  the  expansion  of  the  world,  however,  came  an 
increase  in  the  longing  to  possess  it,  to  master  it,  and  to 
exploit  it.  How  was  Europe  to  do  so,  with  means  so 
scanty,  and  under  the  sway  of  the  ancient  ideas,  which 
said  to  man,  "Dare  not!"  which  taught  him  to  change 
as  little  as  possible  the  order  of  things  under  which  he 
had  grown  up,  and  not  to  yield  to  the  temptation  of 
over-ardent  desires  and  of  over-lofty  ambitions? 

Then  began,  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  cen- 
turies, that  effort  of  thought  and  of  will  which,  slowly 
at  first,  was  destined  gradually  to  arm  our  civilisation 
with  all  the  weapons  necessary  for  the  conquest  and 
exploitation  of  the  earth.  The  sciences  began  their 
advances.  The  first  machines  were  invented  and 
applied.  The  idea  of  liberty  of  progress,  of  the  rights 
of  man,  and  of  the  popular  will  began  to  undermine  the 
ancient  beliefs  and  traditions.  Nevertheless,  it  is  pro- 
bable that  these  would  have  long  resisted,  and  that  the 
ancient  ties  which  restrained  the  human  will  from  the 
great  enterprises  would  have  slackened,  but  not  broken 
for  who  knows  how  many  more  centuries,  if  it  had  not 
been   for   that   immense   event    which   convulsed   the 


More  or  Ijcttcr?  169 

history  of  Europe  and  America,  the  French  Revolution. 
The  French  Revolution  and  the  great  wars  to  which  it 
gave  rise  made  such  and  so  great  breaches  in  the 
ancient  prison-walls  of  traditions  and  principles  in 
which  our  civilisation  was  confined  that  man  could 
thereafter  easily  escape  through  them  and  wander 
freely  over  the  vast  world. 

In  fact,  after  the  French  Revolution,  we  see  the 
beginning  of  a  new  history  of  the  world.  The  ideas  of 
hberty  and  of  progress  invade  Europe  and  America. 
In  every  class  and  in  every  nation  comes  an  awakening 
of  new  desires  for  comiort  and  culture.  Industry  de- 
velops, railways  spread,  inventions  multiply.  Cities 
become  thronged  and  increase  rapidly.  The  great  new 
phenomenon  of  the  history  of  the  world,  the  intensive 
exploitation  of  America,  begins.  The  new  wealth, 
especially  that  produced  in  such  abundance  in  America, 
whets  men's  appetites.  Gradually  the  desire  for  com- 
fort, ease,  and  culture  spreads  to  multitudes  more 
numerous  and  to  new  nations,  drives  followers  along 
in  the  steps  of  pioneers,  in  turn  prompts  others  to 
follow  them,  and  brings  crowding  on  the  heels  of  riches 
already  realised,  the  hungry  greed  of  the  masses;  in  a 
word,  impels  all  Europe  and  all  America  to  the  conquest 
of  the  earth. 

In  consequence,  not  only  America,  but  also  Europe, 
saw  the  beginning  fifiy  years  a;:o  cM'  what  might  be 
truly  called  the  Golden  Age  of  hurian  history,  the  epoch 
of  abundance. 


170  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

What  has  man  dreamt  of  [exclaims  one  of  my  characters] — 
what  has  man  dreamt  of,  since  the  dawn  of  time,  but  the 
Terrestrial  Paradise,  the  Promised  Land,  the  Garden  of  the 
Hesperides,  the  Age  of  Gold,  Arabia  Felix;  one  single  thing, 
under  various  names,  the  empire  of  nature  and  abundance? 
Is  not  the  great  myth  which  centuries  have  mildly  fantasied 
now  at  last  materialising  under  our  eyes? 

But  every  medal  has  its  reverse  side;  and  we  have 
had  to  pay,  and  to  pay  dearly,  for  this  fabulous  abun- 
dance which  man  had  vainly  visioned  for  centuries. 

The  modern  world  [says  another  of  my  characters] 
has  crowned  quantity  at  the  expense  of  quality — ^which  is, 
after  all,  an  eternal  law.  For  I  can  make  in  a  certain  time 
things  of  a  certain  quality,  that  is  to  say,  resembling  a 
certain  model  of  perfection  which  I  have  before  my  ej^es  or 
in  my  mind.  But  in  that  case,  I  cannot  make  any  quantity 
of  it  which  I  may  require.  I  must  rest  content  with  that 
quantity  which  I  can  manage,  working  with  all  my  zeal. 
I  can  say,  on  the  other  hand:  I  want  so  many  things  of  a 
certain  quality.  But  in  that  case,  I  can  no  longer  prescribe 
the  time  necessary  to  finish  them  as  my  fancy  bids  me.  Or 
again:  I  wish  in  so  much  time  to  make  such  a  quantity. 
Very  well;  but  in  that  case,  I  must  put  up  with  the  best 
quality  I  can  get.  So  that  whoever  wants  to  increase  the 
quantity,  and  to  curtail  the  time  must  abate  his  demand 
for  quality.  And  that  is  just  what  we  are  doing  to-day 
in  this  civilisation  of  ours,  in  which  quantity  reigns 
supreme. 

In  the  light  of  this  idea  that  decadence  in  art,  and  in 
so  many  other  refinements  of  life,  which  many  Euro- 
peans impute  to  America,  seemed  to  me  no  longer  the 
effect  of  an  aberration  on  the  i)art  of  the  masses,  but  a 


More  or  Better?  171 

sort  of  compensation.  We  pay,  and  we  ought  to  pay, 
for  the  rapid  fortunes  so  commonly  made  nowadays. 
We  pay,  we  ought  to  pay,  for  the  speed  of  the  trains, 
the  motor-cars,  the  aeroplane,  the  telegraph;  and  the 
price  is  the  mediocrity  which  pervades  everything.  We 
cannot  have,  we  must  not  want,  everything  in  this 
world, — railways  as  well  as  beautiful  pictures,  aero- 
planes as  well  as  the  marvellous  furniture  which  the 
great  French  artists  used  to  make  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  speed  as  well  as  good  manners.  For  among 
the  reproaches  hurled  at  America  by  Europe  is  that  of 
having  banished  from  Europe  b}-  the  example  of  her 
democracy  the  good  manners  of  our  ancient  ceremonial, 
and  substituted  for  it  a  rather  over-simple  and  over- 
casual  cordiality.  But  can  we  expect  the  polished  form, 
for  which  the  eighteenth  century  was  famous,  to  sur- 
vive in  the  social  relations  of  a  civilisation  which,  like 
ours,  is  always  in  a  hurry?  Among  men,  who  live 
between  the  train,  the  motor-car,  and  the  telephone? 
Every  epoch  directs  all  its  efforts  towards  a  supreme 
goal,  which  for  it  is  the  all-important  one.  There  have 
been  epochs  ablaze  with  religious  fervour,  whose  chief 
aspiration  it  was  to  diffuse  and  to  defend  the  faith. 
There  have  been  epochs  with  a  profound  sense  of  the 
ambition  for  glory,  which  fought  great  wars.  Others 
again  have  turned  their  attention  to  the  fostering  of  the 
arts  and  sciences.  Our  civilisation  aims,  in  the  first 
place,  at  the  mastery  over  nature,  and  the  intensive 
exploitation  of  all  the  riches  of  the  earth.    We  enjoy  the 


172  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

advantages  of  it.  We  are  not  inclined  to  abjure  rail- 
ways and  telegraphs.  We  have  no  wish  again  to  run 
the  risk  of  famine,  which  was  such  an  ever-present  one 
to  the  civilisations  of  the  past.  We  enjoy  the  incredible 
abundance  and  liberty  of  the  day  and  are  by  no  means 
eager  to  return  to  the  pristine  regime  of  discipline  and 
parsimony.  We  Europeans  also,  then,  m.ust  resign 
ourselves  to  paying  the  price  which  all  these  advantages 
cost,  and  to  living  in  an  epoch  in  which  art  cannot 
flourish  in  any  high  degree,  in  which  religion  will  no 
longer  have  the  strength  to  emanate  waves  of  mystical 
ardour,  and  even  science  will  be  cultivated  only  so  far 
as  it  can  be  of  immediate  service  to  practical  ends,  by 
intensifying  and  making  more  prolific  the  exploitation 
of  natural  riches.  For  this,  too,  is  a  phenomenon 
noticeable  to-day  in  every  part  of  Europe :  disinterested 
studies  are  falling  into  disfavour.  Rich  as  it  is,  the 
world  of  to-day  is  less  capable  of  searching  after  the 
true  for  the  sole  pleasure  of  expanding  the  field  of 
knowledge,  than  it  was  two  centuries  ago,  when  it  was 
so  much  poorer.  Even  scientists  nowadays  want  to 
see  their  discoveries  turned  into  money. 

The  Americanisation  of  Europe,  then,  is  a  fatal 
phenomenon.  Europe,  from  the  moment  when  she 
aspired  to  great  wealth  and  to  the  dominion  of  nature, 
was  called  upon  to  renounce  her  claim  to  many  of  the 
treasures  of  her  ancient  and  refined  culture.  This  was 
the  conclusion  at  which  I  rested  for  a  moment.    And 


More  or  Better?  173 

yet  at  this  point,  I,  as  a  European,  felt  a  misgiving. 
If  matters  stood  thus,  was  not  Europe  fatally  doomed 
to  become  even  more  thoroughly  Americanised  in  the 
future?  At  the  present  time,  the  appetites  and  ambi- 
tions of  all  classes  in  Europe,  even  the  most  numerous, 
have  been  given  free  rein.  Everybody,  from  the  aristo- 
crat of  ancient  lineage  to  the  most  obscure  peasant, 
wishes  to  earn,  spend,  and  accumulate  as  much  as  he 
can.  There  is  no  power,  human  or  divine,  which  can 
pretend  to  drive  back  towards  its  historical  fountain- 
head  this  immense  torrent  of  greed  and  ambition. 
Europe,  thus,  is  fated  to  become  increasingly  oblivious 
of  the  traditions  of  its  ancient  and  disinterested  culture; 
to  struggle  to  imitate  and  compete  with  America  in  the 
production  of  great  riches  at  greater  speed.  And,  as 
America  with  her  immense  territories  and  smaller  store 
of  traditions  is  better  equipped  for  the  competition,  so 
Europe  must  necessarily  become  ever  more  and  more 
decadent  in  the  future.  The  continent  destined  to 
dominate  the  civilisation  of  the  future,  as  Europe 
dominated  it  up  to  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
will  be  Am'irica. 

There  are  not  wanting  persons  in  Europe  who  take  a 
delight  in  repeating  from  time  to  time  this  prophecy, 
which  to  the  ears  of  a  European  sounds  somewhat 
lugubrious.  For  a  moment,  when  in  America,  I,  too, 
somewhat  discouraged  by  the  vitality  of  which  the 
American  spirit  of  progress  gives  proof,  felt  myself 
inclined  to  give  ear  to  these  ])rophets,  whom  hitherto 


174  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

in  Europe  I  had  always  contradicted.  Yes,  culture  in 
Europe  was  destined  to  become  ever  more  decadent 
before  the  invasion  of  progress  interpreted  in  the 
American  sense;  quantity,  that  is  to  say,  the  nations 
with  vast  territories  at  their  disposal  and  capable  of 
rapidly  producing  vast  wealth,  would  rule  supreme  in 
the  future,  while  the  forces  of  idealism  would  lose  a 
great  part  of  their  ancient  empire  over  the  world, 

America,  however,  actually  America,  proved  to  me 
that  the  ancient  culture  represented  by  Europe  is  not 
destined  to  die  out,  and  that,  if  Europe  is  being  Ameri- 
canised, America  in  compensation  is  being  induced  by 
an  eternal  impulse  to  Europeanise  herself!  I,  like  so 
many  other  Europeans,  had  gone  to  America,  per- 
suaded that  the  American's  only  thought  is  to  make 
money.  But  in  America,  I,  too,  ended  with  the  convic- 
tion that  no  country  in  Europe  expends  so  much  money, 
labour,  and  zeal  on  founding  museums,  schools,  uni- 
versities, and  new  religions;  on  fostering,  in  the  midst  of 
the  mechanical  civilisation  and  the  realm  of  quantity, 
the  arts,  the  religious  spirit,  and  the  disinterested 
sciences;  on  preventing  the  loss  of  that  intellectual 
legacy  of  the  past,  in  which  Europe  takes  an  ever- 
decreasing  interest,  occupied  as  she  is  in  developing  her 
industries  and  her  trade.  If,  out  of  deference  to  his- 
tory, rather  than  to  the  present  day,  we  may  grant  that 
Europe  represents  in  the  world's  history  the  effort 
directed  to  the  perfecting  of  a  lofty  culture,  artistic, 
scientific,  religious,  or  philosophic, — there  is  no  doubt 


Alorc  or  Better?  175 

Dut  that   America  is  to-day  becoming  Europeanised ; 

is  seeking,  that  is  to  say,  to  employ  the  vast  riches 
which  she  has  accumulated  by  the  intensive  exploita- 
tion of  her  territory  in  the  promotion  of  the  progress  of 
art,  knowledge,  and  the  religious  spirit.  Doubtless,  not 
all  the  efforts  she  makes  are  successful;  but  they  are 
numerous,  intense,  and  obstinate.  Indeed,  if  America 
is  open  to  any  reproach  in  this  relation,  it  is,  in  my 
opinion,  to  that  of  feeling  too  ardent  an  admiration 
for  lofty  culture — art  and  science  in  particular — an 
admiration  which  sometimes  blunts  the  critical  sense, 
and  does  not  permit  her  to  distinguish  what  in  the 
world  of  the  ideal  is  authentic  from  what  is  counterfeit, 
the  real  gold  from  pinchbeck.  In  fact,  one  can  find  in 
no  European  count  r}'  so  lively  and  profound  a  trust  in 
science  as  in  America,  Europe  knows  that  science  can 
do  a  great  deal  and  has  done  a  great  deal,  but  that  it 
often  promises,  or  raises  hopes  of,  more  than  it  can  do. 
Not  so  in  America.  Among  the  cultured,  as  among  the 
lower  classes,  faith  in  the  power  of  science  is  practically 
unlimited.  There  is  no  marvel  which  the  American 
does  not  expect  to  see  issuing  from  the  scientist's  closet. 
Even  the  mystical  movements  in  America,  whose  trend 
is  anti-scientific,  like  to  trick  themselves  out  with  the 
name  of  "Science,"  which  has  a  kind  of  magic  sound 
and  glamour  for  the  men  of  the  New  World. 

There  is  the  same  universal  enthusiasm  for  art  in 
America.  It  might  be  said  that  America  is  determined 
to  admire  everything  which  might  possibly  be  beautiful, 


176  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  every  country,  every  epoch,  and  every  school.  It  is 
true  that  the  most  engrossing  preoccupation  of  the 
Americans  is  not  that  of  fostering  the  arts;  they  must 
still  keep  their  minds  fixed  on  the  conquest  of  their 
great  continent.  But  it  is  also  true  that,  in  the  mo- 
ments of  leisure,  when  they  can  think  of  something 
other  than  business,  they  fling  open,  so  to  speak,  their 
arms  to  the  arts  of  the  whole  world.  Just  as  all  the 
styles  of  architecture  can  be  found  in  the  great  buildings 
of  New  York,  so  all  the  arts  which  have  flourished  in 
the  course  of  centuries  in  Asia  and  Europe  have  been 
transplanted  into  the  New  World.  America,  I  might 
almost  say,  wishes  to  taste  and  understand  all  the 
beauties  which  the  past  has  created ;  classical  literature 
as  well  as  contemporary  European  literature,  Italian 
as  well  as  German  music,  Greek  sculpture  as  well  as 
the  French  sculpture  of  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth 
centuries,  Italian  as  well  as  Dutch  painting,  Japanese 
decorative  art  as  well  as  the  styles  of  the  fourteenth, 
fifteenth,  and  sixteenth  Louis.  New  York,  from  this 
point  of  view,  is  a  real  artistic  cosmopolis. 

If,  then,  Europe  is  gradually  destroying  her  ancient 
culture,  and  her  great  traditions,  in  order  to  construct 
railways  and  factories,  to  found  banks  and  to  initiate 
commercial  enterprises,  America,  on  the  other  hand, 
wishes  to  employ  the  wealth  gained  by  the  intensive 
exploitation  of  her  vast  continent  in  creating  an  art 
and  a  science.  How  can  we  explain  this  contrast? 
"The  snobbery  of  a  par  venue  nation,"  it  pleases  the 


More  or  Better?  177 

European,  with  a  shrug  of  the  shoulders,  to  label  it. 
But  anyone  with  any  knowledge  of  America  and  much 
knowledge  of  human  nature  will  not  rest  content  with 
so  glib  an  explanation.  It  is  true  that,  thanks  to 
machinery,  to  America,  and  to  the  idea  of  liberty  and 
progress,  quantity  is  to-day  triumphant  in  the  world. 
j\Ien  wish  to  enjoy  abundance.  Can  they,  however, 
confine  their  wish  to  abundance,  to  the  increase,  that 
is  to  say,  of  the  quantity  of  things  they  possess?  Ob- 
serve a  peasant  who  comes  to  town,  turns  artisan,  and 
earns  a  higher  wage.  What  does  he  do?  Does  he  buy 
with  his  higher  wage  a  second  pair  of  boots,  or  a  second 
suit  in  addition  to  and  like  the  one  he  wore  when  he  was 
poor?  No.  He  adopts  the  town  fashions  and  buys 
more  elegant  shoes  and  clothes,  in  appearance  at  least, 
that  is  to  say,  like  those  worn  by  the  upper  classes.  In 
every  country  of  America  and  Europe,  the  differences 
in  dress  between  the  upper  and  lower  classes,  once  so 
great,  are  disappearing.  Andvv'hy?  Because  the  people 
want  to  dress  like  the  "Swells";  and  modem  industry 
spares  no  trouble  to  give  them  at  little  cost  the  means 
of  satisfying  their  ambition.  In  other  words,  the 
workman  wants  to  invest  his  higher  wage  in  the  pur- 
chase of  finer,  or  what  he  thinks  are  finer,  clothes,  than 
those  he  wore  before,  because  to  possess  a  suit  of  su- 
perior clothes  is  to  him  a  greater  jo}'  than  to  have  two 
suits  of  the  same  workmanship  as  those  he  wore  when 
he  was  poorer.  In  other  words,  quantity  soon  satiates, 
and  at  a  certain  stage  man  needs  to  translate  it  into 


178   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

quality,  and  to  employ  his  wealth  to  procure  for  himself, 
not  a  greater  number  of  things,  but  more  beautiful 
and  better  things,  otherwise  wealth  is  useless. 

If  this  need  is  lively  and  profound  in  the  minds  of  the 
people,  how  much  stronger  must  it  be  in  the  richer 
classes,  those  with  great  resources  at  their  disposal! 
A  man  who  possesses  ten  millions  and  another  who 
possesses  one  hundred  cannot  eat  ten  and  a  hundred 
times  as  much  respectively  as  the  modest  lord  of  only 
one  million,  live  in  a  house  ten  or  a  hundred  times  as 
vast,  or  buy  himself  ten  or  a  hundred  hats  where  the 
other  buys  only  one.  If  they  used  their  wealth  in  that 
way,  they  would  be  considered  mad,  and  with  good  rea- 
son. They  must  then  strive  to  procure  for  themselves, 
with  their  superior  wealth,  things  of  superior  beauty  or 
quality,  to  translate  their  wealth  into  beauty  and  merit, 
quantity  into  quality.  There  are,  it  is  true,  men  who 
desire  wealth  only  for  the  pleasure  of  creating  it,  and 
who  are  indifferent  to  the  other  pleasures  which  it 
brings.  At  no  time,  perhaps,  were  these  men  so  numer- 
ous as  at  present  among  the  great  bankers,  merchants, 
and  manufacturers  who  now  rule  the  economic  destinies 
of  the  modern  world.  But  even  to-day,  these  men,  who 
love  money  as  the  artist  loves  his  art,  in  itself  and  not 
for  the  pleasures  which  it  can  give,  are  in  a  minority. 
And  so  they  will  always  be,  because  even  if — impossible 
hypothesis — anybody  in  the  upper  classes  developed 
such  a  fervid  enthusiasm  for  banking,  industry,  and 
commerce,  as  to  arrive  at  considering  wealth  only  as  an 


More  or  Better?  179 

end  in  itself,  a  means  of  displaying  his  own  ability, 
there  would  still  be  the  women.  Unless  it  be  wished 
that  even  in  the  wealthy  classes,  women  should  engage 
in  business  and  work,  women  will  be  bound  always 
to  consider  wealth  as  an  instrument  for  the  advance- 
ment of  hfe,  procuring  for  its  possessor  joys  more 
select  and  articles  of  superior  quality. 

In  fact,  this  and  no  other  is  the  origin  of  snobbery. 
Snobbery  is,  I  know,  an  obvious  target  for  sarcasm  at 
the  present  day.  And  it  is  easy  to  laugh  at  the  nouveau 
riche  who  is  determined  at  all  costs,  even  at  the  price 
of  sacrifice  and  snubs,  to  frequent  houses  and  circles 
which  formerly  were  closed  to  him;  who  is  glad  to  go 
for  trips  in  a  motor-car,  even  if  they  cause  him  suffering, 
or  to  go  to  the  opera  even  if  he  falls  asleep  there,  be- 
cause he  thinks  that  by  doing  so,  he  is  living  up  to  the 
standard  of  the  highest  elegance.  But  if  he  were  not 
under  this  delusion,  what  would  be  the  use  of  his 
wealth  to  him?  What  compensation  would  he  have 
for  the  fatigues  and  perils  he  had  incurred  in  its  acquisi- 
tion? Snobbery  is  simply  an  effort  to  translate  quantity 
into  quality  to  which  man  is  impelled  by  the  very 
increase  of  wealth.  There  never  was  so  much  snobbery 
as  there  is  at  the  present  time,  because  there  never  was 
so  much  wealth. 

Without  a  doubt,  modern  snobbery  is  full  of  grotesque 
deceptions.  The  world  ne\-er  contained  so  many 
noiivcaiix  rirJws,  unprepared  to  enjoy  the  real  refine- 
ments of  life,  and  destined  to  be  the  victims  of  every 


i8o  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

sort  of  fraud.  How  often  and  in  how  many  instances 
do  we  not  see  the  tragi-comedy  of  Le  Bourgeois  Gentil- 
homme,  MoHere's  immortal  comedy,  acted  over  again 
at  the  present  day?  But  one  can  also  find,  in  America 
perhaps  more  abundantly  than  in  Europe,  families 
whose  wealth  dates  back  several  generations,  in  which 
families  the  mania  for  the  accumulation  of  riches  has 
died  down,  and  which  have  time,  inclination,  and  cul- 
ture enough  to  employ  their  wealth  on  behalf  of  the 
most  lofty  activities  of  the  mind.  These  are  the  Ameri- 
can families  who  ransack  Europe  for  works  of  art,  who 
found  schools  and  museums,  who  give  work  to  archi- 
tects, painters,  and  sculptors,  who  directly  or  indirectly 
stimulate  an  ever-increasing  number  of  the  rising 
generation  not  to  concentrate  on  the  making  of  money, 
but  to  devote  themselves  to  those  intellectual  labours 
of  which,  till  a  short  while  ago,  Europe  had  the 
monopoly.  And  it  is  the  existence  of  this  portion  of 
American  society  and  its  tendencies  that  entitle  us  to 
say  that  America  is  being  Europeanised. 

Europe,  then,  wishing  to  live  a  larger  life,  after 
centuries  of  penury  and  stint,  is  becoming  American- 
ised, and  is  sacrificing  a  part  of  her  splendid  traditions 
of  lofty  culture  to  her  desire  to  learn  from  America  the 
art  of  producing  new  wealth  rapidly.  America,  on  the 
other  hand,  having  accumulated  immense  wealth  by 
the  intensive  exploitation  of  her  territory,  is  becoming 
Europeanised;  she  is  turning,  that  is  to  say,  to  the  arts, 
sciences,  and  most  lofty  forms  of  higher  culture,  to 


More  or  Better?  i8i 

perfect  which  Europe  has  laboured  for  centuries.  Yet 
at  this  point  I  think  I  hear  thiC  reader  cry: 

"  Is  not  this  all  to  the  good?  Does  it  not  estabhsli  a 
marvellous  balance  between  the  two  worlds?  Does  it 
not  prove  that  our  civilisation  is  the  richest,  most 
])owerful,  best  balanced,  and  most  perfect  which  has 
ever  existed?  Ought  Europe  to  have  gone  on  living 
for  ever  in  misery,  intent  only  on  the  perfecting  of 
culture,  and  America  to  have  had  never  a  Thought  for 
anything  but  the  multiplication  of  wealth?" 

To  be  sure,  if  this  exchange  of  wealth  and  culture 
between  the  two  continents  could  be  effected  as  well 
and  easily  as  it  can  be  described,  our  epoch  would  be  in 
very  truth  an  epoch  of  fa.bulous  felicity.  We  might 
claim  to  be,  in  comparison  v\'ith  preceding  generations, 
a  generation  of  supermen.  Unfortunately,  the  difficul- 
ties are  greater  than  tlic}'  seem  at  first  sight  to  he. 
"What  they  are  will  be  seen  in  tl^c  next  cliap^ter;  we  sliail 
then  see  that  it  has  become  tt^ucIi  easier  to  jiroiluce  new 
wealth  than  to  employ  it  in  the  creation  of  a  I'M'ty  nnd 
refined  civilisation;  and  that  this  is  the  secret  torment 
which  afflicts  Europe  and  America. 


IV 

THE  LOST  PARADISE  OF  BEAUTY 

nPHE  bewildering  growth  in  the  wealth  of  America 
■*■  has  affected  in  many  different  ways  the  whole 
world.  Economists  are  studying  its  effects  with  much 
zeal.  One,  and  not  the  least  curious,  of  them,  is  the 
rise  in  the  value  of  antiques.  From  Etruscan  ceramics 
to  French  furniture  of  the  eighteenth  century,  from 
Greek  statues  to  Italian  pictures  of  every  epocli,  from 
Tanagra  statuettes  to  the  lace,  em.broideries,  tapestries, 
manuscripts,  glass,  and  filigree  from,  every  part  of  the 
world,  all  the  artistic  furniture  of  Europe,  Asia,  and 
Africa  which  has  survived  the  ravages  of  time  has 
trebled  and  quadrupled  its  value.  Few  financial  specu- 
lations proved  more  successful  in  Europe  than  the 
collection  about  fifty  years  ago  of  antiques. 

Many  instances  could  be  quoted  to  prove  this. 
Everybody,  even  in  America,  I  suppose,  has  heard 
recently  of  the  great  Paris  tailor  Vv^ho  set  to  work  thirty 
years  ago  to  collect  statues,  jjictures,  and  French  objets 
d'art  of  the  eighteenth  century.  He  spent  about  three 
millions  on  his  collection;  and  he  put  it  up  for  auction 

182 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  1S3 

last  year  and  cleared  fourteen  millions !  An  oecurrence 
which  made  less  noise,  because  it  was  on  a  smaller  scale, 
but  analogous  to  the  foregoing,  is  the  following:  A 
journalist,  a  man  of  taste  and  a  great  admirer  of 
beautiful  antiques,  came  to  Rome.  Everj'body  called 
him  a  maniac,  because,  though  he  had  a  family,  he 
spent  all  his  savings  in  buying  from  the  small  anticjue 
dealers  and  in  the  Campo  di  Fiori  lamps,  books,  stulTs, 
and  every  other  bit  of  antique  he  could  lay  hands  on. 
Well,  he  died  ten  years  ago,  and  left  his  family  nothing 
but  a  houseful  of  fme  antiques.  The  family,  which 
did  not  share  his  mania,  sold  them,  and  realised  a  for- 
tune, the  income  of  which  was,  and  is,  enough  to  sup- 
port them  in  comfort.  If  the  journalist  had  been 
discreet  and  had  invested  his  savings  in  shares  and 
bonds,  probably  his  family  would  now  be  living  in  a 
very  much  humbler  way. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  quote  further  evidence  in  support 
of  so  notorious  a  fact.  Ask  any  Euro])can  antiquarian 
the  reason  for  this  appreciation,  and  he  will  reply  un- 
hesitatingly, "America."  America  for  the  kist  tliirty 
years  has  been  making  assaults  on  the  anti(}uitics- 
market  with  all  the  tenacity  of  her  untiring  activity, 
and  the  might  of  her  new-made  wealth.  Some  people 
in  Europe — those  who  have  antiques  to  sell — are  very 
glad  that  it  should  be  so.  Others  lament,  complaining 
tliat  Europe  is  emptying  herself  of  lier  treasures  in 
favour  of  the  New  World.  Most  peo])le.  however, 
smile  at  what  they  consider  a  i)roof  of  the  incurable 


184  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

snobbery  of  the  New  World.  Europe  is  very  ready  to 
accuse  America  of  loving  antiques  only  because  they 
are  rare  and,  therefore,  dear;  of  fighting  dollar-duels 
about  them,  only  to  prove  their  own  wealth,  without 
any  power  of  judging  and  distinguishing  between  the 
good  and  the  bad,  though  even  among  antiques  there 
are  ugly  as  well  as  beautiful  ones,  representing  com- 
parative grades  of  beauty.  And  this  accusation  too  is, 
in  its  general  application,  unjust  and  unsubstantial. 
Anybody  who  has  had  any  extensive  dealings  with  the 
wealthy  houses  of  New  York,  Boston,  Philadelphia, 
Washington,  and  Chicago,  knows  that  they  contain 
many  Americans  who  are  competent  judges  and  buyers 
of  artistic  antiques.  It  is  true  that,  from  this  point  of 
view,  the  big  American  houses  cannot  yet  challenge 
comparison  with  the  big  European  houses.  Neverthe- 
less, numberless  are  the  marvellous  ceramics  from  the 
Far  East,  numberless  the  magnificent  pieces  of  French 
eighteenth  century  furniture,  numberless  the  pieces  of 
wonderful  lace,  glass,  and  antique  boiseries  which  it 
has  been  my  good  fortune  to  see,  not  without  an 
occasional  pang,  in  America. 

On  the  other  hand,  this  reproach,  which,  couched  in 
its  usual  form,  is  unjust,  contains  a  modicum  of  truth, 
which  however  applies  to  Europe  as  well  as  to  America. 
I  have  often  had  occasion  to  notice  in  wealthy  modern 
houses — in  Europe  as  well  as  in  America,  but  in  Amer- 
ica more  than  in  Europe — that  they  are  adorned 
with  many  extremely  beautiful  old  pieces,   but  that 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  185 

these  are  too  numerous,  and  too  heterogeneous.  You 
find  in  a  modern  drawing-room  material  of  every  ejDoeh 
and  from  all  i)arts  of  the  world;  from  aneient  Greece, 
and  from  China  of  the  last  eentury,  from  the  Italian 
iVIiddle  Ages  and  from  eontem])orary  l^^rsia.  Conse- 
quently modem  houses  are  too  much  like  small 
museums,  in  which  numbers  of  wonderful  little  anticjues, 
picked  up  wherever  they  were  to  be  had,  are  exposed 
to  view,  and  in  wdiich  the  miodern  furniture  and  adorn- 
ments serve  as  the  show-case  in  which  the  antiques  are 
displayed,  instead  of  being,  as  they  were  in  the  eight- 
eenth century,  the  principal  decoration,  of  which  some 
beautiful  antique  was  the  approjjriatc  ornament  and 
complement.  This  inversion  of  the  natural  order  of 
things  would  be  inexplicable,  were  we  not  all  of  us 
persuaded  more  or  less  consciously  that  old  things  must 
necessarily  be  more  beautiful  than  modern  ones.  For 
this  reason  we  are  willing  that  what  we  make,  the 
modern,  shall  be  subordinated  and  serve  as  a  tool  to 
the  antique. 

In  short,  the  antique,  in  Europe  as  in  America,  has 
acquired  nowadays  a  value  of  its  own  in  art,  merely 
on  the  score  of  its  antiquity.  I  need  not  dwell  on  the 
strangeness  of  this  prejudice  in  favour  of  antiques  in 
an  age  and  in  countries  in  which,  directly  one  leaves 
the  field  of  art  l)ehind,  one  finds  so  keen  a  craze  for  the 
modern.  Not  to  be  up-to-date  is  at  the  present  day  the 
greatest  reproach  we  can  fling  at  a  man  in  Europe  and 
in    America,   especially    iti    America.      Why    then    does 


i86  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

modernity  in  art  arouse,  not  only  in  old  Europe,  but 
also,  and  perhaps  more,  in  young  America,  so  much 
diffidence  and  mistrust?  Why  do  we,  notwithstanding 
the  attempts  which  modern  artists  make  to  emulate 
the  ancients  or  to  create  new  things,  turn  to  the  past 
when  we  want  to  possess  or  enjoy  something  really 
beautiful?  May  this  contradiction  be  the  effort  of  a 
last  surviving  prejudice?  For  centuries,  man  was 
educated  to  consider  all  antique  things,  only  because 
they  were  antique,  preferable  to  modern  ones.  In 
many  respects,  we  have  conquered  this  venerable  pre- 
judice. May  our  attachment  to  the  antique  in  art  be 
the  last  and  most  persistent  survival  of  this  sentiment, 
itself  destined  to  disappear? 

No.  This  persistent  attachment  to  the  antique  in 
art  is  not  prejudice;  it  is  the  effect  of  the  incurable 
artistic  weakness  of  our  epoch.  Men  are  following  a 
profound  and  sure  instinct  when,  in  their  desire  for 
beauty,  they  turn  to  the  antique ;  for  art  is  as  it  were  the 
lost  Paradise  of  our  civilisation,  whose  atmosphere  we 
are  always  breathing,  but  to  which  the  entrance  is 
forbidden  us.  It  is  a  phenomenon  of  contemporary 
life  which  usually  attracts  but  little  attention;  and  yet 
how  strange  it  is!  The  need  for  the  adornment  of  life 
with  beautiful  things — for  translating  quantity  into 
quality,  as  I  said  above — has  not  diminished  among 
the  wealthy  classes,  and  could  not  diminish,  because  it 
is  a  profoundly  human  need.  The  world's  upper  classes 
never  had  so  much  wealth  at  their  disposal  as  now,  and 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  187 

never  had  so  keen  a  desire  to  spend  a  considerable  part 
of  it  in  the  purchase  of  beautiful  things.  How  raany 
artistic  masterpieces  could  have  been  paid  for,  and  how 
many  painters,  sculptors,  and  architects  of  genius 
liberally  rewarded  with  half  the  sums  which  have  been 
spent  in  raising  fourfold  or  sixfold  the  value  of  the 
antiquities  of  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa?  Indeed  the 
immense  growth  in  the  world's  wealth  has  profited 
the  dead,  not  the  living,  in  the  world  of  art,  antiquities 
and  not  the  modern  arts.  And  it  was  inevitable  that 
this  should  be  so.    Why? 

Because  modern  times  are  not  adapted  to  be  a  golden 
age  of  art,  for  a  psychological  and  moral  reason,  which, 
however,  is  not  to  be  sought  in  the  practical  and  com- 
mercial spirit  of  modern  times.  Alany  of  the  fairest 
palaces  and  pictures  which  we  admire  in  Italy  were 
commissioned  l:)y  merchants  who  were  no  less  practical 
than  modern  bankers.  The  reason  is  to  be  sought  else- 
where, and  it  is  more  profound.  Modern  civilisation 
has  conquered  with  its  railways.  tclegra])hs.  and  steam- 
boats, the  whole  earth.  In  fifty  years,  it  has  succeeded 
in  conquering  continents  so  vast  as  North  America. 
It  has  created  riches  so  fabultxis.  in  a  word,  it  has 
achieved  so  much  power,  because  it  has  broken  through 
all  the  limits  within  which  the  s]^irit  of  tradition  con- 
fined past  generations.  Escaping  tVoni  these  limits,  it 
has  learned  to  create  at  great  siieed.  S])eed  and  the  tire- 
less spirit  (if  innovation  arc  the  two  formidable  weapons 
which  have  ijiven   our  civilisation   the  victorv   in  her 


i88  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

struggle  with  nature  and  with  the  other  more  con- 
servative and  more  deHberate  civihsations.  But  the 
quaHties  necessary  to  artistic  excellence  are  just  the  two 
opposite  qualities :  the  spirit  of  tradition  and  laborious 
deliberateness. 

We  moderns,  victims  of  the  giddy  pace  at  which  we 
live,  may  be  somewhat  oblivious  of  the  fact ;  but  it  is  a 
fact  that  anyone  who  knows  history  cannot  ignore. 
To  create  and  foster  an  art  really  worthy  of  the  name,— 
Greek  sculpture,  Italian  painting,  the  French  decora- 
tive art  of  the  eighteenth  century, — the  immense  sums 
at  our  disposal  are  useless,  and  the  sciences  of  steam  and 
electricity  of  no  avail.  I  have  already  had  occasion  to 
prove  this  in  the  preceding  chapters.  The  nations  and 
the  generations  which  have  created  the  most  famous 
arts  and  whose  relics  are  still  our  delight,  were  poor 
and  ignorant  compared  with  us.  In  order  to  create  and 
foster  art,  it  is  necessary  to  educate  generations  of 
artists  to  do  good  work  and  generations  of  amateurs  to 
understand  and  appreciate  it.  Neither  the  artists  nor 
the  public  taste  can  be  educated  without  a  spirit  of 
tradition  and  of  aesthetic  discipline,  which  induces  the 
public  to  allow  the  artists  the  time  necessary  for  the 
perfecting  of  their  respective  arts  in  all  their  details; 
which  induces  the  artist  to  recognise  the  legitimate 
requirements  of  the  public  for  which  he  works,  and  to 
seek  to  satisfy  it  by  adapting  his  own  work  to  those 
requirements. 

Anyone  can  see,  however,  that  nowadays  these  two 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  189 

conditions  have  l)ecome  well-nigh  inii)ossiblc.  In  the 
gigantic  confusion  of  the  modern  world,  races,  cultures, 
and  poi)ulations  are  continually  intermingling,  (fen- 
erations follow  each  other  with  the  fixed  determination 
not  to  continue  what  their  immediate  predecessor  has 
done  but  to  do  something  different.  Ancient  traditions 
are  dying  out,  and  no  new  ones  are  being  formed  or  can 
be  formed.  Change  is  the  order  of  the  day.  Sons  but 
rarely  adopt  their  father's  professions,  and  not  a  few 
die  in  lands  other  than  those  in  which  they  were  born. 
Modern  society  is  agitated  by  a  continual  process  of 
renewal,  which  is  the  deep-seated  source  of  her  energy 
and  activity,  but  is  also  a  reason  for  her  artistic  de- 
cadence. In  this  continual  m.obility  of  bodies,  wills, 
and  ideas;  in  this  j)erpctual  change  of  tendencies,  tastes, 
and  standards,  art  is  losing  her  bearings  and,  alone  in 
this  age  of  bold  enterprises,  is  becoming  greedy  and 
diffident. 

Public  and  artists,  instead  of  helping  each  other,  have 
grown  timid.  The  public  no  longer  does  what  it  likes. 
It  no  longer  has  any  standard  of  judgment.  It  has 
become  timid  and  diffident.  It  is  ol)sessed  by  the  fear 
of  mistaking  a  masterpiece  for  a  deception  or  a  decei)- 
tion  for  a  masterpiece.  This  uncertainly  of  tastes  and 
desires  in  the  public  in  its  turn  bewilders  the  artists. 
When  the  painter,  the  sculptor,  the  musician,  and  the 
poet  try  to  hnd  in  the  desires  and  inclinations  of  the 
pul)lic  the  sure  indication  which  in  times  ])ast  used  to 
be  the  support  and  guidance  of  artists  in  their  creations, 


190  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

they  find  that  the  public  is  ready  to  admire  anything, 
but  has  no  marked  preference  for  anything  in  particular. 
The  artist  is  free,  but  his  liberty  is  a  liberty  which 
embarrasses  and  paralyses  him. 

Under  these  circumstances,  the  adroit  artists  quickly 
learn  the  art  of  exploiting  the  uncertainties  and  inex- 
periences of  the  public,  and  win  riches  and  honours. 
The  crazy  and  the  charlatans  seek  to  intimidate  the  pub- 
lic by  perpetrating  novelties  of  extravagant  audacity. 
Serious  and  conscientious  artists  there  are  nowa- 
days, of  course,  but  everyone  has  new  formulae  of  his 
own  art,  differing  from,  those  of  everyone  else,  and 
proclaims  his  to  be  the  only  true,  fruitful,  and  admirable 
formulas,  at  the  same  time  denouncing  all  others  as 
freaks.  By  what  standard  are  we  to  judge  these 
quarrels?  Bewildered  by  so  many  different  attempts 
and  judgments,  the  public  ends  by  turning  to  the 
antique.  It  has  a  vague  idea  that  the  past  ages  may 
have  been  inferior  to  our  own  in  all  other  respects,  but 
in  art  were  superior  to  it.  It  knows  that  a  work  of  art 
at  least  one  century  old  may  be  more  or  less  beautiful, 
but  that  it  is  at  least  a  serious  work  of  art,  conceived 
and  carried  out  in  good  faith,  not  for  the  mystification  of 
an  ingenuous  public  by  some  daring  theory  of  novelty. 

So  the  Europeans  are  wrong  in  ridiculing  the  passion 
of  the  Americans  for  ancient  things.  This  passion  has 
the  same  origin  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic  as  it 
has  on  this.  In  art,  our  civilisation  is  destined  to 
remain  inferior  to  ancient  civilisations,  which  it  has 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  191 

overshadowed  with  its  wisdom,  its  power,  and  its 
wealth.  This  is  the  reason  for  the  rapid  growth  in  the 
value  of  the  antique  in  art,  even  in  the  age  of  modernity 
a  oiitrancc.  We  need  feel  no  shame  in  avowing  it 
openly.  Civilisations  and  epochs,  like  individuals,  can- 
not have  and  expect  everything;  and  the  share  which 
has  fallen  to  us  of  the  good  things  of  the  earth  is  so 
large,  that  we  can  readily  console  ourselves  for  the 
loss  of  this  particular  one. 

Who  reasoned  thus  would  reason  wisely.  Neverthe- 
less, the  fact  is  of  greater  importance  than  it  ai)pears. 
It  shows  that  the  balance  between  the  ancient  culture 
of  Europe  and  the  spirit  of  American  culture — that 
balance  which  might  perhaps  have  produced  the  niost 
brilliant  civilisation  in  history--will  never  be  perfectly 
secured,  at  least  so  long  as  the  conditions  of  the  world 
remain  what  they  now  are.  America  will  be  able  to 
continue  her  Europcanisation,  and  Europe  her  Ameri- 
canisation,  as  we  have  seen  is  the  case.  But  this 
interchange  of  influences  will  not  have  as  its  only  result 
the  increase  of  the  wealth  of  Euroi^e  and  of  the  culture 
of  America.  It  will  give  birth  in  tlie  two  worlds  to  a 
discontent  and  an  unrest  which  nothing  will  be  able  to 
allay. 

In  fact,  the  more  its  upper  classes  come  under  the 
influenc:e  of  the  culture  of  the  Old  World,  the  more 
ardent  will  l)ecome  the  admiration  and  desire  uf 
America  for  the  antitjue,  -  for  that  l)eauty  which  the 
civilisations    preceding    our    own    created    with    such 


192  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

wealth  and  perfection  of  forms;  the  more  strongly  will 
it  be  convinced  of  our  artistic  inferiority,  and  persuaded 
that  one  of  the  treasures  of  life  we  have  lost  irreparably, 
and  can  only  enjoy  in  the  relics  of  other  generations. 
Every  picture  or  statue  or  artistic  object  which  crosses 
the  ocean  and  enters  America,  every  museum  which  a 
rich  Maecenas  opens  in  the  New  World  to  the  public 
or  which  a  city  or  a  state  creates,  every  chair  founded, 
and  every  book  of  artistic  history  printed, — everything, 
in  fact,  which  brings  the  spirit  of  America  into  contact 
with  the  masterpieces  of  ancient  European  art,  and 
awakens  recognition  and  admiration  for  them,  makes 
America  at  the  same  time  recognise  how  comparatively 
decadent  is  that  which  our  times  produce;  reveals  to  it 
that  lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  around  whose  closed  gates 
we  are  now  condemned  to  hover.  This  contact  with 
the  artistic  achievement  of  the  past  becomes,  therefore, 
at  the  same  time  a  gadfly  of  discontent  and  unrest  to 
the  upper  and  cultured  classes. 

By  an  inverse  process,  the  further  the  spirit  of  Ameri- 
can progress  penetrates  into  Europe,  the  more  com- 
pletely does  it  detach  the  Old  World  from  its  past,  and, 
therefore,  irritates,  grieves,  and  disgusts  the  classes 
which  have  enough  culture  to  recognise  and  admire  the 
marvellous  arts  of  that  past.  With  every  ten  years 
that  elapse,  we  feel  that  our  past,  with  all  its  radiant 
glories,  has  receded  a  hundred  years ;  that  we  are  plung- 
ing into  a  new  world,  in  which  riches,  knowledge,  and 
our  power   over  nature  will  increase,    but  which  will 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  193 

be  ugly,  inharmonious,  and  vulgar  compared  with  the 
centuries  wiiich  preceded  it.  Many  Americans  fail  to 
understand  why  Europe  cherishes  so  many  latent 
antipathies  to  America,  which  has  never  done  her 
any  harm,  directly  at  least.  The  real  reason  for  these 
antipathies  must  be  looked  for  in  the  artistic  decadence 
which  accompanies  the  develo|)ment  of  modern  civilisa- 
tion. That  civihsation  has  not  been  created  by  America 
alone,  but  by  America  and  Europe  combined.  Eu- 
rope and  America,  therefore,  share  the  responsibility 
for  this  decadence.  Yet  it  suits  the  European  book 
from  time  to  time  to  see  in  America  the  symbol  of  the 
civilisation  of  railways,  steam,  electricity,  business,  and 
industry  on  a  large  scale;  and  Euro])eans  gladly  vent 
on  America  their  spleen  for  v.iiatcver  in  this  civilisation, 
pregnant  with  good  and  v»-ith  evil,  offends  them  and 
arouses  regret. 

In  short,  there  is  an  insoluble  contradiction  between 
progress,  as  our  age  understands  tlic  word, — between  the 
"American"  progress,  as  many  Europeans  call  it, — and 
art.  This  contradiction  has  as  yet  attracted  but  little 
notice,  in  the  still  great  confusion  in  which  we  live,  in 
the  initial  tumult  of  this  new  civilisation  which  is  invad- 
ing the  earth.  It  will  be  noticed,  however,  more  and 
m.ore  strongly,  as  generation  succeeds  generation,  and 
in  many  families  the  primary  hunger  for  wealth  is 
satiated  and  gives  way  to  the  desire  to  "translate 
quantity  into  quality":  as  American  love  for  the 
historical   beauties   of   the   Old   World   increases,   and 


194  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Europe  takes  further  lessons  in  the  multiplication  of  her 
wealth.  There  is  no  escape  or  salvation  for  our  civilisa- 
tion from  the  discontent  and  unrest  which  will  arise 
from  this  contradiction.  It  is  a  torment  which  will 
grow  with  the  growth  of  wealth  and  culture;  which 
nations  and  classes  will  feel  more  acutely  the  richer 
and  the  more  cultivated  they  become;  from  which  per- 
haps, one  day,  America  will  suffer  more  severely  than 
many  European  nations;  which  will  oppress  the  upper 
classes  much  more  heavily  than  the  people.  The  latter, 
indeed,  will  not  feel  it  at  all,  and  will  alone  be  able  to 
live  in  modern  civilisation,  as  contented  as  man  ever 
can  be  in  this  world. 

History  often  has  strange  surprises  in  store.  The 
civilisation  of  machinery  tended  at  its  birth  to  appear 
as  a  death-blow  to  the  working  classes,  a  godsend  to  the 
upper  classes.  For  years  and  years,  socialism,  generalis- 
ing from  the  initial  rubs,  predicted  and  pretended  to 
prove  that  the  great  mechanical  industry  must  enrich 
a  small  oligarchy  inordinately,  and  reduce  to  the 
blackest  wretchedness  the  great  mass  of  the  population ; 
that  a  new  feudalism  of  capitaHsts,  fiercer  than  the 
barons  of  the  Middle  Ages,  would  seize  all  the  good 
things  of  the  world.  A  century  passes,  and  we  find  this 
civilisation  giving  com.plete  satisfaction  only  to  the 
workmen,  because  it  can  content  the  workmen  only 
from  the  double  point  of  view  of  quantity  and  quahty. 
It  gives  them  an  abundance  which  only  a  small  fraction 
of  the  people  enjoyed  up  to  a  century  ago;  and,  at 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  195 

the  same  time,  bestows  on  them  a  luxury  which  fully 
satisfies  their  yet  simple  and  unsophisticated  aesthetic 
sense.  We  may  smile  \\hen  we  see  in  a  workman's 
home  mirrors  and  clocks  which  are  the  rudest  imitations 
of  masterpieces  of  the  Louis  X\'  and  Louis  X\^I  styles, 
hideous  reproductions  from  a  German  factory;  and 
coarse  carpets  which  are  poor  European  copies  of 
beautiful  Turkish  and  Persian  models,  the  result  of  the 
substitution  of  the  iron  teeth  of  a  machine  for  tlie 
industrious  fingers  of  the  hum^an  hand,  and  of  decadent 
aniline  dyes  for  the  brilliant  and  unfading  vegetable 
colours.  The  workman,  however,  docs  not  know  the 
matchless  models  of  which  these  objects  are  the  ugly 
copies,  and,  inasmuch  as  every  arsihetic  verdict  arises 
out  of  a  comparison,  these  reproductions  represent  for 
him  the  summit  of  perfection,  and  entirely  satisfy  his 
need  for  beautiful  things  round  about  him. 

To  the  upper  classes,  on  the  other  hand,  this  civilisa- 
tion has  given  immense  and  imposing  wealth,  such  as 
no  epoch  had  ever  considered  possible;  but  it  has  de- 
prived them  of  the  means  of  enjoying  it.  Wealth 
becomes  nowadays  more  useless,  the  greater  it  becomes, 
because  a  multi-millionaire  cannot  1  )uild  himself  a  house, 
wear  clothes,  or  buy  objects  a  hundred  limes  finer  and 
better  than  the  possessor  of  only  a  few  millions.  We  no 
longer  have  artists  capable  of  accoi:i])lishing  miracles. 
The  men  of  great  wealth  are  forced  to  compete  wlih 
each  other  for  the  relics  of  past  beauty  at  fabul(nis 
prices,  when  they  are  not  inclined  to  spend  all  their 


196  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

wealth  for  the  benefit  of  others.  These  reHcs  are  not 
sufficient,  however,  to  satisfy  the  desire  for  beauty  and 
art  which  grows  in  our  times  with  the  growth  of  wealth 
and  of  culture.  On  the  contrary,  they  only  make  us 
feel  more  acutely  the  decadent  vulgarity  of  everything, 
with  but  few  exceptions,  which  our  age  produces. 

Someone  will  say  that,  after  all,  this  torment  is  not  a 
very  serious  one ;  and  that  men  will  easily  find  means  of 
consoling  themselves.  No  epoch,  as  I  have  already  said, 
can  have  everything;  and  modern  civilisation  bestows 
on  the  wealthy  classes  of  our  times  numberless  compen- 
sations for  the  ugliness  of  the  modern  world.  One  of 
these  should  be  enough  by  itself  to  content  even  the 
most  discontented:  that  kind  of  bodily  and  mental 
ubiquity  which  is  enjoyed,  thanks  to  the  prodigious 
inventions  of  modern  genius.  Cannot  the  wealthy, 
thanks  to  their  riches,  remove  from  one  continent  to 
another,  travel,  have  dealings  and  acquaintances  in, 
and  receive  communications  from,  every  part  of  the 
world,  come  to  know  the  most  distant  and  recondite 
beauties  of  nature  and  of  art — in  a  word,  live  over  the 
whole  globe?  A  modern  great  man  may  well  feel 
himself  almost  a  demigod  compared  with  the  men  of 
two  centuries  ago,  so  great  is  the  sway  his  money  gives 
him  over  the  forces  of  nature,  so  easily  can  he  escape 
from  the  tyranny  which  space  and  time  used  to  exercise 
over  men  up  to  a  century  ago.  May  not  the  intoxica- 
tion of  this  proud  sway  be  worth  as  much  as  the  pleasure 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  197 

which   the  works  of  Phidias,  ]\IicheIangelo,  Raphael, 
and  Houdon  gave  to  our  ancestors? 

It  is  true  that  the  j)ride  of  our  knowledge  and  the 
intoxication  of  our  power  stun  us,  and  therefore  help  us 
to  bear  with  greater  patience  the  want  of  more  aesthetic 
pleasures.  But  this  compensation,  like  all  compensa- 
tions, is  of  its  very  nature  provisional.  It  is  not  possible 
utterly  to  destroy  a  need  inherent  in  human  nature. 
There  is  at  the  present  day  a  certain  tendency  in  the 
world  to  consider  art  as  a  superfluous  frivolity,  as  a 
luxury  only  to  be  thought  of  in  moments  of  leisure. 
Art  and  such-like  superfluities  are  contrasted  with  what 
are  called  the  serious  occupations,  the  practical  realities 
of  life:  industry,  commerce,  inventions,  business,  and 
wealth.  Those  who  hold  this  oi)inion  forget,  however, 
that  the  sculptures  of  Phidias  and  the  paintings  of 
Raphael  appeared  in  the  world  long  before  the  steam- 
engine  and  the  Voltaic  pile.  Are  we,  too,  prepared  in 
face  of  this  fact  to  affirm,  with  the  most  advanced 
champion  of  the  American  idea  of  progress  in  niy 
dialogue,  that  "history  was  off  the  track  up  to  the  dis- 
covery of  America"?  That  if  men  had  had  any  sense, 
they  would  have  invented  machinery  ami  developed 
the  sciences  first,  and  then  created  and  developed  the 
arts?  But  even  if  we  were  ])repared  to  maintain  tliis 
paradoxical  theory,  another  fact  of  common  observa- 
tion would  be  there  to  prove  to  us  that  beauty  is  not  a 
luxury  and  whim  of  gentlemen  of  leisure,  but  ;i  ])nmary, 
universal,  and  indestructible  need  of  our  minds,  which 


198  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

every  human  creature  seeks  to  satisfy  as  best  it  can. 
Do  we  not  see  every  day  that  the  peasant  and  the 
artisan,  items  in  modern  civiHsation  though  they  are, 
no  sooner  have  a  little  money  than  they  try  to  procure 
for  themselves  ornaments,  either  for  their  persons  or  for 
their  homes,  which  may  be  as  tawdry  as  you  like,  but 
which  to  them  seem  beautiful  and  well  worth  the  expen- 
diture of  some  of  the  little  money  they  have?  Have 
we  not  seen  that  one  of  the  merits  of  modem  civilisation 
is  that  of  satisfying  the  sestheLic  needs  of  the  masses? 
Why  should  we  not  expect,  then,  to  find  the  same  need, 
though  in  a  refined  and  intense  form,  felt  by  those  to 
whom  superior  intelligence  and  energy,  or  the  favour 
of  fortune,  has  granted  the  power  to  accumulate  wealth 
in  large  quantities,  those,  in  other  words,  who  have  at 
their  disposal  greater  means  of  procuring  for  themselves 
the  pleasures  and  good  things  of  life? 

No:  the  artistic  impotence  of  modern  civilisation  is 
likely  to  prove,  to  judge  by  the  first  effects  which  are 
now  beginning  to  manifest  themselves,  a  graver  phe- 
nomenon than  is  at  present  realised.  The  upper  classes 
in  Europe  and  America  will  not  be  able  to  go  on  for  an 
indefinite  length  of  time  living  with  a  consciousness  that 
the  world  in  which  they  find  themselves  is  ugly,  coarse, 
and  decadent  in  comparison  with  preceding  civilisa- 
tions ;  feeling  the  inferiority  of  the  present  more  acutely 
the  more  they  study,  and  at  the  same  time  extending 
still  further  their  sway  over  the  world  and  accumulating 
new  riches  to  console  themselves  for  it.    This  would  be 


The  Lost  Paradise  of  Beauty  199 

a  state  of  moral  want  of  balance;  and  moral  want  of 
balance  cannot  continue  indefinitely,  just  as  physical 
want  of  balance  cannot  continue  indefinitely.  Either 
our  civilisation  will  abate  its  aspirations  to  the  level 
of  the  mediocrity  which  it  is  capaf)le  of  producing  in  art, 
destroying  in  itself  the  remembrance  of  and  regret  for 
those  ancient  civilisations  which  created  so  many  beau- 
tiful things;  or  it  will  have  to  put  itself  into  a  position 
to  satisfy  not  only  the  cesthetic  needs  of  the  masses,  but 
also  those  of  the  more  cultured  and  refined  strata  of 
society.  The  first  supposition  appears  improbable,  or 
at  least  no  man  of  sense  will  wish  to  consider  it  possible. 
It  would  mean  a  relapse  of  the  world  into  barbarism, 
the  end  of  all  the  traditions  and  all  the  studies  which 
have  been  and  still  are  an  indispensable  element  of 
intellectual  and  moral  refinement.  So  we  are  left  with 
the  other  hypothesis,  which  assumes  that  man  will 
make  up  his  mind  one  day  to  make  an  effort  to  create 
arts  of  his  own,  which  will  survive  comparison  with 
those  of  the  past. 

Yet  the  task  is  an  arduous  one.  As  I  have  already 
said,  an  art  is  not  created  or  perfected  without  the 
spirit  of  tradition  and  of  discipline;  and  the  attempt 
in  our  times  to  re-infuse  vigour  into  the  spirit  of  tradi- 
tion and  of  discipline,  if  only  in  the  measure  necessary 
for  the  progress  of  art,  is  an  enterprise,  the  difilcultics 
of  which  everyone  can  understand  without  a  long 
explanation.  It  cannot  be  effected  without  a  profound 
intellectual  and  moral  reform,  which  will  bring  about  a 


200  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

change  in  many  things  besides  the  originality  and  power 
of  the  arts  which  are  to-day  languid  and  decadent.  So 
the  struggle  betv/een  American  progress  and  art  may 
well  be  a  more  important  phenomenon  than  is  at 
present  apparent;  and  may  well  entail  transformations 
of  far-reaching  extent. 


V 

BEYOND    EVERY    LIMIT 

r^OR  century  after  century,  our  civilisation  lay  low 
■'•  in  its  IVIediterranean  lair.  It  knew  but  a  small 
part  of  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa ;  and  no  pricks  of  curios- 
ity impelled  it  to  ascertain  how  far  the  world  extended 
over  land  and  sea  beyond  the  vague  bounds  which 
marked  the  limit  of  its  efforts.  That  small  part  of  the 
world  satisfied  the  ambitions  of  our  ancestors,  though 
they  certainly  were  not  shy  and  craven.  Confined  in 
that  narrow  corner  of  the  earth  and  with  only  the  scanty 
resources  which  it  could  provide,  they  created  litera- 
tures, arts,  philosophies,  states,  laws,  and  religions. 
Some  of  these  creations  are  alive  to  this  day,  and  help 
us  distant  descendants  to  shed  a  little  beauty  and  to 
impose  a  little  order  on  the  modern  world. 

Between  the  fifteenth  and  the  sixteenth  centuries 
there  began  a  great  change  m  the  history  of  our  civili- 
sation. Impelled  by  the  wish  to  reach  India  by  way  of 
the  Atlantic,  our  forefathers  began  to  explore  the  earth. 
Gradually  geographical  exploration  bcc-ame  the  pre- 
occupation of  governments,  the  passion  of  the  public, 


202  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  the  business  of  a  great  number  of  persons  who  made 
almost  a  vocation  of  these  daring  voyages.  And  behold 
one  fine  day,  one  grand  day,  the  most  fortunate  and 
daring  of  the  navigators  who  were  exploring  the  Atlantic 
in  every  direction  discovered  America.  In  mid-Atlan- 
tic there  lay  two  connected  continents,  stretching  from 
one  hemisphere  to  the  other,  covering  many  latitudes 
and  a  great  variety  of  clime,  and  much  of  this  vast 
territory  was  still  but  sparsely  inhabited.  It  was  then 
that  our  forefathers  realised  how  vast  and  rich  was  the 
earth,  and  how  small  and  poor  in  comparison  seemed 
that  Mediterranean  world  in  which  for  so  many  cen- 
turies they  had  lived.  It  was  then  that  they  began  to 
pass  beyond  the  limits  within  which  they  had  been  so 
long  confined,  to  invade  and  to  conquer  the  outside 
world. 

The  Pillars  of  Hercules,  which  had  been  the  impass- 
able geographical  limit  of  the  ancient  Mediterranean 
world,  were  not,  however,  the  only  bounds  which  they 
passed ;  they  transcended  also  the  moral  and  intellectual 
limits  which  until  then  had  circumscribed  their  thoughts 
and  actions.  All  the  time  that  the  ancient  Mediter- 
ranean civilisation,  turned  loose  into  the  Atlantic,  was 
striking  root  and  expanding  in  America,  an  unin- 
terrupted sequence  of  events  and  movements  was 
taking  place  in  Europe,  destroying  ancient  laws,  ancient 
traditions,  and  ancient  discipline;  upsetting,  in  other 
words,  the  bounds  placed  in  the  past  to  the  thought, 
the  sentiment,  and  the  will  of  Man.     The  most  impor- 


Beyond  Every  Limit  203 

tant  of  these  events  were :  the  Protestant  Reformation, 
the  philosophies  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries,  the  advanees  of  science,  the  French  Revolu- 
tion and  its  wars,  the  birth  and  the  development  of  the 
great  industrial  movement,  and  the  all  but  universal 
triumph  of  democratic  ideas. 

Little  by  little,  while  the  aspect  of  the  globe  changed, 
a  great  revolution  was  taking  place  in  the  spirit  of  the 
ancient  Christian  civilisation  in  Europe,  which  from 
being  dictatorial  and  traditionalist  became  free  and 
progressive.  Religion,  which  for  so  many  centuries 
had  been  a  kind  of  severe  moral  discipline,  a  life  of 
prohibitions,  scruples,  rules,  precepts,  ceremonies,  and 
rites,  changed  into  a  kind  of  free  contemplation  of  the 
Deity  in  which  the  individual  conscience  had  full  play. 
Everybody  became  his  own  high  priest. 

The  ceremonial  of  social  life,  which  at  no  time  had 
been  so  complicated,  serious,  and  exacting,  gradually 
became  so  far  simplified  as  no  longer  to  encumber  man 
in  his  every  movement  and  activity.  The  State,  which 
at  one  tim.e,  hand-in-hand  with  religion,  watched  over 
the  customs  and  life  of  its  citizens,  accorded  greater  and 
greater  liberty  to  them.  To-day  everybody,  provided 
he  contributes  to  society  his  daily  sum  of  work,  is  free 
to  live  and  think  as  he  likes.  Severe  laws  used  once 
upon  a  time  to  regulate  men's  luxuries  and  pleasures. 
Every  class  was  forbidden  to  s|)eiKl  its  money  in  any 
way  other  than  that  prescribed  !)>•  these  laws.  There 
v.cre  times  of  the  year  in  which  nien  were  forbidden  to 


204  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

amuse  themselves,  and,  when  amusements  were  allowed, 
the  laws  took  care  that  they  should  not  degenerate  into 
vice.  Nowadays  the  whole  year  is  one  long  festival 
and  carnival  for  all  who  have  money  to  spend;  and 
together  with  freedom  in  pleasure  men  have  acquired 
also  a  freedom  in  vice  which  would  scandalise  our 
friends  the  ancients,  if  they  might  come  back  to  life 
again. 

Every  authority  is  losing  power.  The  people  discuss 
the  government  and  the  laws;  children  take  the  first 
opportunity  of  escaping  from  the  authority  of  their 
parents.  The  younger  generation  is  convinced  that  it 
knows  more  than  the  older,  and  values  the  latter's 
experience  at  zero.  Traditions  are  losing  their  force 
and  academics  their  prestige.  Everyone  holds  the 
opinion  he  likes  in  religious,  artistic,  political,  and  moral 
questions;  just  as  he  is  free  to  regulate  his  own  conduct, 
at  his  own  risk  and  peril,  as  he  pleases,  with  the  sole 
obligation  of  respecting  the  limits  imposed  by  the  laws, 
which  are  for  the  most  part  neither  numerous  nor 
embarrassing. 

What  is  the  deep-lying  cause  of  this  duplex  and  con- 
temporaneous movement?  Why  has  the  old  Christian 
civilisation  of  Europe  felt  itself  in  the  last  four  centuries 
unable  any  longer  either  to  contain  itself  within  the 
ancient  material  limits  or  within  the  ancient  ideal 
limits?  Why,  at  the  same  moment  as  it  advances  to 
the  conquest  of  new  continents,  does  it  destroy  within 
itself  all  the  ancient  disciplinary  restrictions?     Because 


Beyond  Every  Limit  205 

in  these  last  centuries  it  has  gradually  discovered  that 
the  earth  is  much  vaster  and  richer  than  it  suspected; 
that  it  contains,  in  old  Europe,  as  well  as  in  young 
America,  treasures  in  much  greater  abundance  than 
it  had  ever  pictured  in  its  dreams;  and  that  it  can  invent 
tools  which  briiig  these  rapidly  within  its  reach. 
Gradually,  as  man  found  that  he  could  rob  nature  of  her 
immense  treasures,  there  arose  and  spread  from  genera- 
tion to  generation  through  all  classes  in  Europe  and 
America  a  craze  for  wealth  and  a  mad  ambition  to  win 
the  master}'  over  nature,  such  as  the  world  had  never 
yet  seen. 

To  satisfy  this  craze  and  this  ambition,  however,  it 
was  necessary  to  break  many  of  the  innumerable  bonds 
— religious,  moral,  aesthetic,  and  political, — which 
limited  the  energy  and  initiative  of  our  forefathers. 
How  could  so  m.any  millions  of  men  have  brought 
themselves  to  emigrate  to  Am.erica,  if  the  spirit  of 
tradition  had  not  been  weakened  in  Europe,  and  if 
everybody  had  continued  to  hold,  as  they  did  once  upon 
a  time,  that  the  greatest  good  fortune  a  man  could  have 
was  that  of  being  buried  in  the  church  in  which  he  had 
been  baptised?  Even  to-day  there  are  those  who 
lament  the  diminution,  in  all  the  Christian  churches 
during  the  last  few  centuries,  of  the  number,  complexity, 
and  rigour  of  the  rites  and  ceremonies,  just  as  otlicrs 
lament  th;it  the  ceremonial  of  social  life  and  etiquette 
is  dving  out.  But  would  not  men  who  arc  ol)liged  to 
work,  tra\cl,  and  rush  about  as  we  do  nowadays  find 


2o6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

themselves  embarrassed  beyond  the  point  of  endurance 
by  a  rehgion  which  made  them  spend  too  much  time 
over  rites,  and  by  a  complicated  etiquette  like  that 
which  still  prevails  in  the  states  of  the  East,  requiring  a 
large  part  of  the  day  to  be  spent  in  compliments  and 
ceremonies?  Europeans  often  laugh  at  the  architecture 
of  New  York;  and  I  must  confess  that  I,  too,  found  it 
distinctly  bizarre.  On  the  other  hand,  could  that  vast 
city  have  grown  and  renovated  itself  so  rapidly  in 
the  last  century,  and  have  found  accommodation  for  the 
countless  multitudes  which  throng  to  it  from  all  the 
corners  of  the  world,  if  those  who  built  it  had  troubled 
themselves  to  observe  the  rules  formulated  by  the  great 
architects  of  the  sixteenth  century,  in  the  days  when  it 
took  as  much  time  to  build  a  palace  and  a  church  as  it 
now  does  to  construct  a  city? 

Modern  society,  if  compared  with  the  societies  which 
preceded  it,  may  seem  in  many  of  its  aspects — and  in 
fact  it  is — ugly,  poor  in  artistic  beauty,  coarse,  and 
brutal.  It  may  even  seem  atheistic  and  irreverent, 
frivolous  and  superficial  in  matters  of  religion,  and,  in 
certain  respects,  morally  lax  or  downright  licentious. 
This  kind  of  disorder,  however,  which  is  such  a  common 
subject  of  heart-burning,  is  only  the  necessary  effect  of 
the  outburst  of  our  energy  over  the  world  and  nature 
on  its  path  of  conquest.  A  civilisation  cannot  produce, 
refine,  or  perfect  arts  or  traditions  of  elegance  and  of 
social  life,  or  a  morality  and  a  religion,  if  it  does  not 
adopt  an  attitude  of  reserve,  if  it  does  not  limit  itself 


Beyond  Every  Limit  207 

to  some  extent,  if  it  does  not  sacrifice  its  other  ambi- 
tions and  aspirations  to  this  object.  A  civiHsation  Hke 
ours,  whose  supreme  aspiration  it  is  to  extend  in  the 
shortest  possible  time  and  as  far  as  it  can  its  empire 
over  the  world;  to  surpass  all  the  limits  which  nature 
seeks  to  oppose  to  its  restless  ambitions  and  to  the 
multiform  energy  of  man,  must  needs  sacrifice  beauty, 
refinement,  elegance,  and  moral  delicacy  to  rapidity, 
energy,  activity,  and  daring.  The  discover)^  and  de- 
velopment of  new  countries,  the  marvellous  i:)rogress  of 
America,  the  discoveries  of  science,  the  perfection  of 
machinery,  the  ideas  of  liberty  which  emerge  trium- 
phant from  political  revolutions  and  changes  in  customs, 
the  weakening  of  the  spirit  of  authority  in  ever>'  de- 
partment of  social  life,  the  abolition  of  so  many  limits 
which  once  entangled  the  movements  of  man,  are 
all  phenomena  which  are  mutually  and  indissolubly 
connected. 

"Yes,"  many  will  say;  "and  they  arc  phenomena 
which  all  go  to  make  up  the  grandeur  and  glory  of  the 
modem  world.  We  have  power,  wealth,  knowledge, 
and  liberty,  the  four  blessings  of  which  our  forefathers 
had  little,  if  any,  knowledge.  What  cause  have  we 
then  to  grumble?  And  amongst  all  the  blessings  which 
modern  times  shower  upon  us,  perhaps  the  most 
precious — more  precious  than  wealth,  power,  and 
knowledge^is  liberty.  If  we  have  no  reason  to  regret 
the   past,   it  is  chiefly  because  our  forefathers  lived, 


2o8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

imprisoned,  and  in  suffering,  within  limits  which  we 
have  overstepped.  Is  there  any  greater  joy  for  a  man 
than  that  of  being  able  in  thought,  feeling,  and  action 
to  follow  the  inner  impulse  of  his  own  conscience, 
instead  of  making  it  bend  to  an  external  will,  whether  it 
be  that  of  the  law,  or  that  of  the  public,  or  that  of  a 
tradition?  Surely  the  modern  world  is  the  greatest  as 
well  as  the  most  fortunate  which  has  ever  existed?" 

That  is  what  many  people  think,  and  thoughts  like 
this  breed  the  optimism  which  at  the  present  day  cheers 
so  many  minds.  This  thought  is,  moreover,  partially 
true;  but  only  partially.  For  in  the  intoxication  of 
their  triumph  over  nature,  of  the  riches  which  they 
have  conquered  so  easily  and  in  such  abundance,  men 
seem  not  to  recognise  that  this  civilisation  without 
limits  is  little  by  little  allowing  that  same  unbridled 
energy  to  hurry  it  into  excesses  which  threaten  to  drive 
it  back  into  that  very  state  of  barbarism  from  which  it 
has  made  so  many  efforts  to  escape.  The  impetus 
which  it  has  acquired,  now  that  it  has  cast  off  so  many 
of  its  ancient  restraints,  is  great;  but  the  danger  is 
precisely  that  this  impetus  may  carry  it  too  far. 

I  have  already  said  that  amongst  the  limits  abolished 
by  modern  civilisation  are  those  which  preceding  civili- 
sations had  placed  on  luxury.  How  great  a  change  has 
taken  place  in  men's  ideas  on  this  subject  during  two 
centuries!  Simplicity  and  austerity  were  considered 
for  centuries  virtues  proper  to  saints  and  heroes. 
Christianity  had  gone  so  far  as  to  glorify  poverty  in  so 


Beyond  Kvcry  Limit  209 

many  words.  Man,  by  increasing  his  needs,  only  in- 
creased the  number  of  his  masters  and  tyrants;  only 
multipHed  for  himseh'  occasions  for  sorrow.  Tlie  more 
simply  a  man  could  live,  the  freer,  stronger,  and  happier 
he  was.  In  short,  in  ancient  times,  up  to  the  French 
Revolution,  religion,  law,  and  tradition  set  limits  on 
every  side  to  man's  desire  to  possess  and  to  enjoy; 
and  these  limits  were  so  numerous  and  so  close,  that 
they  entailed  no  little  suffering  on  the  generations  con- 
strained to  live  vvithin  them.  That  is  why  we  have  up- 
set them  all.  And  what  is  the  result  ?  That  we  no 
longer  have  any  sure  criterion  by  which  to  distinguish 
reasonable  consumption  from  insensate  waste,  legitimate 
need  from  vice.  We  can  no  longer  say  what  are  the 
limits  at  which  it  is  reasonable  and  wise  for  the  peasant, 
the  artisan,  the  small  tr^idesman,  the  man  of  leisure, 
the  millionaire,  the  multi-millionaire,  the  child,  the 
woman,  the  old  man,  respectively,  to  cr\'  a  halt  to  their 
desires.  All  micn  and  all  c-lasscs  arrogate  to  thcn.i- 
selves  the  right  to  desire,  to  spend,  even  to  waste  as 
mtich  as  they  can.  No  one  lias  any  ck^ir  idea  of  a 
standard  by  which  to  distinguish  ^vlKlt  he  may  desire 
and  what  he  ought  to  deny  himself.  .\  kind  of  universal 
prodigality  is  becoming  obligatory  in  every  class;  and 
modern  civilisation  is  hurrying  towards  an  unbridled, 
gross,  and  oppressive  orgy.  Tlicrc  is  already  a  large 
number  of  men  in  Eur()]-)e  and  America  who  cat,  drink, 
and  smoke  to  excess;  who  over-indiilgc  in  intoxicating 
and  stimulating  drinks;  and  who  spend  themselves  in 
14 


210  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

that  continual  whirl  of  diversions  and  distractions  which 
form  so  large  a  part  of  modern  life.  The  number  is 
fated,  however,  to  grow  yet  larger,  rapidly  and  in- 
definitely. Is  not  production  increasing  on  every  side? 
Is  not  progress  for  us  first  and  foremost  the  continual 
increase  of  production?  And  what  avails  it  to  produce 
more,  if  the  riches  produced  do  not  find  consumers? 

The  modern  world,  in  freeing  men's  desires  from  all 
the  ancient  limits  and  restraints,  has  given  a  vigorous 
impulse  to  human  industry.  In  order  to  satisfy  the 
increased  needs  of  the  masses,  man  has  invented 
machinery,  and  has  put  a  premium  on  the  new  coun- 
tries. But  precisely  because  there  is  no  longer  limit  or 
restraint  to  men's  desires,  industry,  which  in  the  past  was 
the  handmaiden  of  human  needs,  is  now  becoming  their 
tyrant.  It  is  creating  and  multiplying  our  needs  with 
a  view  to  their  subsequent  satisfaction.  In  order  that 
it  may  never  be  short  of  work,  it  is  tempting  men  in  a 
thousand  ways  to  desire  and  to  consume  more.  There- 
fore our  civilisation  has  made  of  riches  not  the  fitting 
means  of  satisfying  reasonable  and  legitimate  needs, 
but  an  end  in  themselves.  We  are  obliged  to  produce 
them  in  order  to  consume  them,  and  to  consume  them 
in  order  to  produce  them.  Every  moment  which  a  man 
does  not  spend  in  producing  riches,  he  must  spend  in 
consuming  the  riches  produced  by  others;  so  that  he 
can  never  stay  still  for  one  instant,  but  must  jump  from 
occupation  to  amusement,  and  from  amusement  back 
again  to  occupation.     He  must  try  to  make  the  day  as 


Beyond  Every  Limit  211 

long  as  possible,  accustoming  himself  to  do  everything 
at  full  speed,  and  cutting  down  the  hours  of  sleep  as 
much  as  possible.  Everybody  knows  that  we  moderns, 
especially  in  the  great  cities,  are  losing  the  habit  of 
sleeping. 

We  have  not  yet  mentioned,  how^ever,  the  most 
serious  drawbacks  of  the  present-day  lack  of  any  fixed 
limit  to  men's  desires.  In  the  past  ages,  the  eflorts  of 
religion  were  directed  to  educating  men  to  self-intro- 
spection; to  teaching  them  to  explore  their  own  con- 
sciences, to  render  account  to  themselves  of  their  own 
sins  and  vices,  and  to  try  to  amend  them.  One  might 
even  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  from  one  point  of  view 
Christianity  w^as  principally  a  melancholy  meditation 
on  the  perversity  of  human  nature,  and  an  effort  to 
purify  it  through  meditation,  suffering,  and  the  love  of 
God.  One  has  only  to  read  the  letters  of  Saint  Cather- 
ine, or  the  Divine  Coynedy,  or  Pascal's  Pcnsccs  to  realise 
to  what  an  extent  the  moral  refinement  which  is  the 
fruit  of  these  meditations  preoccupied  the  loftiest  minds, 
and,  at  second  hand,  the  great  ones  of  the  earth  in  past 
centuries.  A  considerable  part  of  the  energies  of  every 
generation  was  consumed  in  this  introspective  effort, 
instead  of  in  action;  for  centuries  and  centuries,  saints, 
moralists,  and  preachers  abounded  in  Europe,  while 
men  of  action,  fit  to  conquer  the  world  and  its  riches, 
nature  and  her  secrets,  were  scarce. 

This  searching  of  the  inward  parts  was  not  always 
soothing    by    any    manner    of    means.     For    the    past 


212  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

century  and  a  half,  numerous  writers  and  philosophers 
have  denounced  it  as  one  of  the  refinements  of  torture 
with  which  religion  in  the  past  made  men's  lives  a 
burden  to  them.  Perhaps,  however,  they  are  wrong; 
for  this  effort,  which  religion  made  for  so  many  centuries 
to  habituate  man  to  self-introspection,  self-knowledge, 
and  self -judgment,  demands  a  less  superficial  explana- 
tion. However  great  be  the  force  of  the  laws  and  the 
vigilance  of  public  opinion,  there  can  be  no  convenient 
order  in  a  social  system,  if  man  does  not  help  by  exer- 
cising some  sort  of  surveillance  over  himself,  if  he  does 
not  give  ear  to  an  inward  voice,  forbidding  him  to  take 
advantage  of  every  opportunity  of  doing  evil  with 
impunity  which  may  offer  itself.  This  necessity  for 
self-restraint  is  particularly  urgent  in  connection  with 
three  duties:  the  duty  of  speaking  the  truth,  the  duty  of 
checking  one's  own  inclination  to  pleasure,  especially 
in  the  relations  between  the  sexes,  and  the  duty  of  not 
using  one's  own  strength  improperly  at  the  expense  of 
the  weak.  Many  are  the  times  when  we  could  tell  a 
lie  with  impunity,  or  even  with  advantage  to  ourselves, 
if  we  wished  to  do  so;  and  yet  it  is  necessary  that  we 
should  speak  the  truth  spontaneously,  in  order  that 
justice  may  triumph.  How  easy  it  is  for  the  man  who 
has  become  the  slave  of  vice  to  evade  the  eyes  of  his  fel- 
lows and  to  satisfy  in  secret  his  most  perverse  passions ! 
And  what  system  of  laws  can  be  conceived  which  will  be 
wise  and  perfect  enough  to  bar  all  the  countless  ways 
in  which  the  stronger  can  impose  upon  the  weaker? 


Beyond  Every  Limit  213 

Every  religion  with  more  or  less  success — and  none 
with  more  success  than  Christianity — in  centuries  past 
helped  law  and  public  opinion  to  regulate  this  most 
important  part  of  morality.  They  all  made  a  sacred 
thing  of  an  oath,  which  is  nothing  but  a  covenant  which 
every  individual  enters  into  with  himself  to  speak 
the  truth,  even  when  he  could  lie  with  impunity  or 
with  advantage  to  himself.  They  all  created  a  sexual 
moralit}^  to  regulate  love,  marriage,  and  the  family. 
They  endeavoured  in  various  ways  to  awaken  in  the 
consciences  of  the  rich  and  powerful  the  recognition 
of  certain  duties  of  moderation  and  charity  towards 
the  weak  and  the  poor.  Nowadays,  on  the  contrary, 
men  no  longer  have  time  to  examine  their  consciences, 
or  to  reflect  on  their  own  vices  and  defects,  or  on  their 
own  duties  and  rights.  The  whole  atmosphere  of  our 
lives  is  exterior  to  ourselves;  we  are  always  moving 
about  and  always  busy.  We  have  become  almost 
incapable  of  meditation  and  self-introspection.  Our 
times  no  longer  lay  any  store  by  this  education  of  our 
inner  feelings.  The  only  discipline  they  impose  on 
man  is  that  of  work.  Everybody,  whether  of  high 
degree  or  of  low,  is  required,  under  penalty  of  losing  his 
daily  bread  or  of  dropping  in  the  social  scale,  to  fill  with 
exactness,  precision,  diligence,  and  correctness,  the  r61e, 
be  it  little  or  big,  which  has  been  allotted  to  him  in  the 
immense  operations  of  our  times.  But,  for  the  rest, 
everyone  is  to-day  much  more  free  than  he  was  in  the 
past  to  adjust  his  line  of  action  to  his  own  beliefs,  and 


214  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

to  make  for  himself  his  own  standard  and  his  own  laws. 
The  result  is  that  all  the  scruples  and  internal  re- 
straints with  which  religion  endowed  the  conscience  of 
man  in  the  past  are  growing  rusty  from  disuse.  Our 
civilisation,  rich  and  splendid  as  it  is,  threatens  to  be 
spoiled  by  fraud,  by  evil  habits,  and  by  oppression. 
There  is  no  doubt  about  it ;  not  even  in  these  days  is  the 
discipline  of  work  sufficient  in  itself  to  keep  the  State 
in  good  order.  Man  is  not  a  living  machine,  destined 
only  to  produce  riches.  When  he  leaves  his  office  and 
comes  back  into  the  world,  the  modern  man  there  finds 
a  family,  sons,  parents,  friends,  persons  of  the  other  sex 
who  may  attract  him,  men  richer  and  more  powerful 
than  himself,  others  weaker  and  poorer,  political  insti- 
tutions and  public  problems;  in  short,  opportunities  of 
doing  good  or  evil,  temptations  dangerous  but  agreeable, 
and  duties  painful  but  necessary.  And  our  times  not 
only  give  him  practically  no  moral  assistance  to  conquer 
these  temptations  and  to  perform  these  duties,  but 
rather  in  many  ways  incite  him  to  yield  to  the  tempta- 
tions, and  to  exercise  his  cunning  in  evading  the  duties. 
Fraud  in  particular  is  becoming  simply  second  nature  to 
our  civilisation.  What  is  the  great  industrial  movement 
of  modern  times  but  a  continual  deception  for  cloaking 
the  deterioration  which  it  is  bringing  about  in  the 
quality  of  things  as  the  price  of  increasing  the  quantity 
of  them?  Every  day  sees  an  increase  in  the  number  of 
cleverly  faked  objects,  which  are  not  what  they  seem; 
and  science — especially  chemistry — is  the  highly  paid 


Beyond  Every  Limit  215 

accomplice  which  furnishes  industry  with  the  means  of 
imposing  this  colossal  deception  on  an  inexperienced 
and  ingenuous  public.  In  other  words,  commerce  and 
industry,  which  play  so  large  a  part  in  modern  life,  are 
becoming  more  and  more  a  colossal  deception  in  which 
he  succeeds  best  and  makes  most  money  who  is  cleverest 
at  lying  to  the  public  and  at  foisting  on  them  goods  of 
inferior  quality  though  superior  in  outward  seeming. 
Now  if  we  see  in  a  social  system,  on  the  one  hand, 
a  weakening  of  all  the  internal  restraints  which  keep  a 
man  from  lying  and  cheating,  and,  on  the  other,  a  pre- 
mium put  on  that  same  lying  and  cheating,  must  we 
not  expect  to  find  fraud  permeating  the  whole  system? 
And  what  will  our  customs  be  like,  what  will  life  be  like, 
in  the  days  when  nobod}'  any  longer  feels  any  remorse 
or  scruple  in  cheating  his  neighbour,  and  when  every- 
body becomes  cheat  and  cheated  turn  and  turn  about, 
cheat  in  matters  which  he  understands,  cheated  in  those 
in  which  he  has  to  rely  on  other  people? 

The  growing  depravity  of  customs,  furthermore, 
threatens  us  \\'ith  no  less  a  danger.  I  do  not  wish  to 
exaggerate  the  horrors  of  the  modern  Babylons,  as 
Catholic  priests  and  Protestant  ministers  are  apt  to  do. 
Their  grief  at  seeing  the  rising  generation  turn  a  deaf 
ear  to  their  wise  counsels  makes  them  take  too  gloomy  a 
view  of  the  present  state  of  affairs.  Nevertheless,  it  is 
certain  that  the  customs  of  modern  civilisation  are 
hurrying  it  towards  a  dangerous  crisis.  The  internal 
restraints  are  being  relaxed,  and  temptations  and  facili- 


2i6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

ties  are  multiplying  with  the  growth  of  riches  and  of 
cities,  and  with  the  increasing  mobility  of  persons  of 
both  sexes,  so  many  of  whom  it  prompts  to  leave  their 
native  village  or  country.  Especially  in  the  big  cities 
where  everyone  is  unknown,  can  easily  hide  away,  and 
is  watched  by  nobody ;  where  money  has  greater  power 
over  men's  minds  because  there  is  more  of  it  and  more  of 
it  is  needed, — virtue  runs  serious  and  continual  risks. 
Without  being  aware  of  it,  we  are  undoing,  little  by 
little,  Christianit3''s  great  contribution  to  the  chasten- 
ing of  our  customs,  by  suppressing  many  of  the  limits 
which  Christianity  had  established  with  such  labour  in 
the  midst  of  the  unbridled  licence  of  the  ancient  world. 
We  are  travelling,  therefore,  step  by  step  back  towards 
paganism,  v/ith  all  its  conveniences  and  all  its  perils. 
Already,  in  fact,  we  can  see  cropping  up  here  and 
there  in  the  richer  and  more  highly  civilised  countries 
and  classes  that  mortal  sickness  which  killed  the  ancient 
civilisations:  sterility.  One  of  the  reasons  why  all  the 
most  flourishing  ancient  civilisations  have  perished  is 
that  at  the  moment  of  their  greatest  glory  the  popula- 
tion suddenly  began  to  dwindle;  and  this  sterility  which 
killed  them  was  the  effect  to  a  large  extent  of  the  licence 
of  their  customs.  Love  remains  fertile  only  so  long  as 
it  restrains  itself  and  limits  itself.  Christianity,  by 
subjecting  men's  customs  to  discipline — one  of  the 
noblest  of  its  services  to  mankind — succeeded  for 
centuries  in  maintaining  in  Europe  and  America  an 
incessant  fertility,  which  has  proved  to  be  one  of  the 


Beyond  Every  Limit  217 

most  potent  causes  of  the  increase  of  our  power.  But 
now  we  can  see,  with  the  return  of  the  world  to  pagan- 
ism, the  beginning  of  a  new  era  of  sterility,  especially  in 
the  big  cities  and  in  the  most  ancient  and  most  wealthy 
states. 

Lastly,  I  have  referred  to  another  danger  which 
threatens  this  our  social  system,  victim  as  it  is  of  its 
limitless  desires;  I  mean  the  increase  in  the  opportuni- 
ties for  the  strong  to  abuse  their  strength.  This  is 
certainly  the  least  of  the  three  evils;  for  thanks  to  the 
diffusion  of  culture  and  of  liberty,  the  weak  have  learned 
and  are  able,  to  unite  in  their  own  defence.  Some 
balance  of  justice  is  obtained  and  will  continue  to  be 
obtained  by  opposing  force  to  force.  The  balance, 
however,  will  be  in  external  things  rather  than  in  men's 
convictions.  For  in  this  unbridled  and  limitless  chase 
after  money  and  enjoyment,  of  which  the  world  is  the 
theatre,  the  spirit  of  charity  is  obscured;  and  men's 
minds  become  accustomed  to  a  hardness  and  brutality 
which  may  perhaps  one  day  startle  the  world  in  a  dis- 
agreeable and  terrible  way. 

It  may  seem  to  some  of  my  readers  that  I  take  a 
delight  in  uttering  gloomy  prognostications  of  the  future 
of  modern  civilisation.  Such,  however,  is  not  my  in- 
tention. Who  would  dare  to  deny  that,  notwithstand- 
ing its  defects,  the  civilisation  in  which  we  have  the 
good  fortune  to  live  is  the  most  splendid  and  powerful 
on  which  the  sun  has  ever  shone?     But  its  very  grand- 


2i8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

eur,  which  is  to  so  large  an  extent  the  fruit  of  our 
boldness  in  overthrowing  most  of  the  limits  which 
preceding  civilisations  had  placed  to  human  energy, 
gives  birth  to  a  new  and  formidable  problem  which  is 
already  beginning  to  confront  our  speed-loving  civilisa- 
tion, and  which  is  itself,  too,  a  problem  of  limits,  perhaps 
of  the  limit  par  excellence.  And  that  problem  may  be 
expressed  in  one  question:  Quousque  tandem?  Up  to 
what  point,  in  our  desire  to  conquer  the  world  and  its 
treasures,  to  multiply  riches,  and  to  increase  our  power 
over  nature,  must  we  and  can  we  sacrifice  beauty,  and 
the  forms,  ceremonies,  and  refinements  of  life,  moral  and 
aesthetic  ?  Up  to  what  point  must  we  and  can  we  make 
legitimate  use  of  the  liberty  which  the  modern  world  has 
given  us;  and  at  what  point  does  abuse  of  it  begin? 

This  is  the  vital  problem  which  I  have  posed  and 
tried  to  dissect  in  the  dialogue  which  my  travels  in 
America  inspired  me  to  write:  the  problem  treated  in 
the  speeches  and  discussions  of  the  many  characters, 
European  and  American,  who  figure  in  that  dialogue. 
It  may  seem  strange,  at  first  sight,  that  a  discussion  of 
the  Old  World  and  the  New,  in  which  the  contending 
parties  propose  to  prove  which  is  superior  to  the  other, 
should  end  in  this  second  problem,  apparently  so  unlike 
the  first ;  whether  it  is  necessary  or  not  to  place  a  limit 
on  the  unbridled  activity  and  immoderate  desires  of  our 
times.  Anyone  who  has  read  the  present  series  of 
essays,  however,  will  be  less  likely  to  find  this  conclusion 
singular   and   obscure.     I    have   repeatedly   said,    and 


Beyond  Every  Limit  219 

tried  to  prove,  that  there  is  too  great  a  tendency  on 
both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  to  find  an  antagonism  between 
Europe  and  America.  If  certain  tendencies  are  stronger 
in  one  of  the  two  continents,  and  weaker  in  the  other, 
these  are  diflferences  of  quantity,  not  of  quaHty.  Amer- 
ica is  becoming  Europeanised,  and  Europe  Americanised. 
However  Httle  reflection  and  cool  reasoning  the  Euro- 
pean may  bring  to  his  abuse  of  America  on  the  score  of 
its  excessive  zeal  in  the  production  of  riches,  or  the 
American  to  his  abuse  of  Europe  on  account  of  the 
scanty  remains  of  the  spirit  of  tradition  and  conserva- 
tism in  the  Old  World,  each  will  recognise  that  he  is  at 
the  same  time  inveighing  against  his  own  continent. 
In  fact,  Europe  applies  herself  with  no  less  zeal  than 
America  to  the  production  of  greater  wealth;  and 
America  is  no  less  anxious  than  Europe  to  enjoy  the 
advantages  which  may  even  now  accrue  to  the  world 
from  the  spirit  of  tradition. 

Consequently  the  discussion  of  the  question  whether 
America  is  superior  to  Europe  or  Europe  to  America  is 
a  futile  enterprise  and  labour  lost ;  because  the  balance 
between  the  differences  is  rapidly  adjusting  itself. 
Nevertheless,  if  any  difference  exists  to-day  between  the 
two  continents,  it  is  undoubtedly  this:  that  all  the 
phenomena  of  social  life  in  America  are  simpler  and 
clearer,  and  less  overlaid  and  obscured  by  traditions, 
institutions,  and  century-old  ideas  and  sentiments  than 
in  Europe.  For  this  reason,  the  careful  observer  will 
find  in  America  a  much  more  profitable  field  for  the 


220  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

study  of  the  dangerous  tendencies  and  exaggerations  of 
modern  civilisation  which  are  common  to  Europe  and 
America.  Of  these  dangerous  tendencies,  the  one  which 
has  struck  me  most  in  the  course  of  my  travels  in 
America,  and  has  given  me  most  food  for  thought,  is 
precisely  this,  which  I  have  treated  in  this  my  latest 
work  and  which  forms,  as  it  were,  the  crown  to  the 
whole  discussion  of  the  dialogue.  Modern  civilisation 
has  accomplished  miracles  and  marvels  without  num- 
ber, since  she  left  behind  her  the  limits,  material  and 
ideal,  within  which  the  timid  generations  of  old  con- 
fined themselves, — since  she  outstepped  and  upset  these 
limits  on  her  way  to  conquer  the  earth,  riches,  and 
liberty.  Now,  however,  precisely  because  she  has 
crossed  all  the  limits  and  no  longer  has  any  before  her, 
she  finds  herself  impelled  on  every  side,  in  politics, 
customs,  morals,  art,  and  philosophy,  to  excesses  which 
may  one  day  prove  very  dangerous.  Men  are  beginning 
to  have  a  vague  presentiment  of  this  danger.  They  do 
not  clearly  see,  however,  the  quarter  from  which  it 
threatens.  They  disquiet  themselves  without  thor- 
oughly diagnosing  the  evil.  And  this  disquietude  may 
perhaps  explain  the  pessimism  which  afflicts  a  civilisa- 
tion so  flourishing  and  fortunate  in  many  respects  as 
that  of  our  own  times. 

For  this  reason,  I  thought  that  the  great  problem  of 
the  limits  might  grow  little  by  little,  on  board  a  trans- 
atlantic liner,  out  of  a  discussion  about  America.  An 
Italian,  who  has  made  money  in  America,  and  who,  like 


Beyond  Every  Limit  221 

so  many  Europeans  who  have  made  their  fortune  thus, 
is  an  admirer  of  the  New  World,  one  evening  launches 
out  into  a  eulos^y  of  }-oung  America  at  the  expense  of 
old  Euro]je.  He  extols  the  civilisation  of  machinery, 
progress,  and  libert}-,  by  contrast  with  what  remains  in 
Europe  of  the  ancient  civilisation  whose  efforts  were 
directed  to  improving  the  quality  of  things  rather  than 
augmenting  their  quantity;  which  left  the  world  poor 
while  it  created  arts,  religions,  moralities,  and  rights. 
The  discussion  becomes  heated,  complicated,  and  diffuse 
until,  under  the  guiding  influence  of  an  old  savant  who 
knows  Europe  and  America  too,  it  concentrates  on  this 
point:  Granted  that  man  was  well-advised  to  exceed 
the  ancient  limits  within  which  preceding  civilisations 
had  confined  him,  to  hurl  himself  on  the  world  and  to 
conquer  it ;  up  to  what  point  may  man  aspire  to  liberty 
in  even,'  department  of  life,  without  endangering  in  the 
long  run  the  most  precious  fruits  of  his  conquest? 

The  book  docs  not  pretend  to  solve  this  formidable 
problem.  No  philosopher,  no  writer,  no  book  could 
solve  it.  It  can  onh'  be  solved  by  a  radical  revolution 
in  the  ideas,  sentiments,  and  interests  of  the  masses. 
But  the  book  which  I  have  written  purports  to  throw 
light  on  some,  at  least,  of  the  essential  aspects  of  the 
problem.  It  endeavours  to  make  it  clear  to  the  men  of 
our  time,  by  harping  on  a  principle  of  great  antiquity, 
great  simplicity,  and  great  modesty,  which  may  be 
perhaps  usefully  recalled  to  the  memor\'  of  present 
generations,  in  Europe  as  well   as  in  America.     That 


222  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

principle  is,  that  man  is  a  being  of  limits;  and  that  he 
ought,  therefore,  to  observe  in  his  desires  a  certain  mean. 
A  civilisation  must  remember  that  it  is  the  sum  of  the 
efforts  of  a  great  many  individuals;  that  these  indi- 
viduals may  be  very  numerous,  but  that  each  one  is  a 
small  limited  being;  and  that  the  sum  of  their  efforts 
cannot  be  infinite.  Consequently,  a  civilisation  must 
not  let  its  desires  and  wishes  extend  untrammelled  in 
every  direction.  It  must  learn  to  confine  itself  within 
limits. 


VI 

THE  RIDDLE  OF  AMERICA 

TN  Argentina,  there  are  vast  and  luxuriant  valleys, 
*  over  which  the  train  seems  to  creep  toward  the  very 
edge  of  a  horizon  which  ever  recedes  as  the  traveller 
advances.  From  time  to  time,  four  or  five  red  one- 
storied  houses,  clustered  behind  a  station,  recall  to  his 
mind  the  fact  that  this  wilderness  is  actually  inhabited. 
In  Brazil,  so  far  as  the  eye  can  see,  there  are  ranges  of 
mountains,  shadowy  even  in  brilliant  daylight,  in  the 
midst  of  which,  from  time  to  time,  one  mountain  stands 
out  more  distinctly  than  its  fellows.  The  shadowy  hills 
arc  those  still  covered  by  the  primeval  forest ;  the  others, 
those  where  the  timber  has  been  burned  off  and  replaced 
by  cofTee  plantations;  but  even  here  there  is  no  trace  of 
human  life.  One  must  travel  long  hours  by  railroad 
before  even  catching  sight  of  a  village. 

In  North  America,  or  at  least  in  its  Eastern  States, 
there  are  vast  and  desolate  tracts.  From  time  to  time 
a  village  appears,  bristling  with  chimneys.  Then  the 
traveller  slips  on  into  the  deserted  country.  Another 
village  appears,  only  in  its  turn  to  disappear.    Then  all 

223 


224  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

at  once  the  train  begins  to  rush  through  the  midst  of 
houses.  On,  on  it  goes.  The  houses  never  cease  to 
follow  it.  Huge  edifices  rise  from  the  midst  of  the  little 
dwellings  like  giants  from  a  crowd  of  dwarfs.  Auto- 
mobiles and  trolley  cars  move  through  the  streets.  It 
is  a  great  city ;  half  a  million,  a  million,  two  million  men 
are  crowded  together  there  in  the  shadow  of  a  thousand 
chimneys,  surrounded  on  every  side  by  an  almost 
deserted  country.  What  a  strange  sight  are  these 
wildernesses  to  a  European  accustomed  to  live  in  one  of 
the  crowded  countries  of  the  Old  World  where  men  have 
built  their  houses  everywhere,  from  the  shores  of  the 
sea  up  to  the  highest  habitable  slopes  of  the  mountains! 
In  observing  a  phenomenon  so  novel  to  his  experience, 
the  historian  of  antiquity  is  deeply  interested;  and  as  he 
studies  it,  like  so  many  other  Europeans  in  the  presence 
of  the  same  spectacle,  he  forgets  his  own  preoccupations. 
The  riddle  of  America  rises  before  him  and  the  desire 
of  finding  an  answer  to  it  turns  him  from  his  former 
studies.  For  America  is  a  true  riddle  to  Europeans. 
During  the  past  thirty  years,  not  only  the  United 
States,  but  even  smaller  American  countries  like  Brazil 
and  Argentina,  have  impressed  themselves  sharply  upon 
the  attention  of  Europe.  The  Old  World  has  been 
compelled  to  recognise  that  America  has  in  her  turn 
become  a  mighty  historic  force;  and  that  she  exercises 
an  influence  on  the  Old  World  which  grows  continuously 
greater.  When  one  reflects  that,  only  a  century  and  a 
half  ago,  all  these  American  states  were  merely  poverty- 


The  Riddle  of  America  225 

stricken  colonies  of  Europe,  harshly  exploited  by  their 
European  masters,  one  cannot  suppress  amazement  at 
the  rapidity  with  which  their  destiny  has  changed. 

What  power  is  it  which  has  worked  this  miracle? 
On  this  point,  it  is  impossible  to  feel  any  doubt;  the 
power  is  wealth.  These  plains  and  these  mountains 
which  look  so  deserted  are  tilled,  mined,  worked  with 
intensest  energy;  and  every  year,  with  a  generosity 
which  seems  inexhaustible,  they  yield  to  the  men  who 
have  toiled  over  them  prodigious  quantities  of  cereals, 
tobacco,  coffee,  wool,  gold,  silver,  iron,  oil — an  enor- 
mous torrent  of  riches  which  pours  over  the  entire 
world.  The  great  industrial  cities  of  North  America 
manufacture  these  raw  materials  with  profits  so  large 
and  swiftly  won  that  to  the  Old  World  they  seem  fan- 
tastic. In  these  plains,  in  these  valleys,  in  these  moun- 
tains, in  these  cities,  labourers  receive  higher  wages, 
merchants  and  manufacturers  make  their  fortunes 
faster,  capitalists  come  into  contact  with  mightier 
interests,  landlords  draw  higher  rents  from  this  pro- 
sperity— all  the  sources  of  profit  are  more  abundant 
than  in  Europe.  And  these  conditions  have  made  it 
possible  for  a  few  of  Fortune's  favourites  to  pile  up  in 
the  course  of  a  single  lifetime  wealth  whose  vastness 
makes  the  brain  swim.  America  has,  in  fact,  succeeded 
in  producing  riches  at  a  rate  of  speed  that  man  has  never 
yet  attained  elsewhere  in  the  world.  She  has  been  the 
principal  factor  in  the  fabulous  increase  of  the  world's 
wealth  during  the  last  fifty  years.     Her  riches  have 

IS 


226  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

become  one  of  the  historic  forces  of  our  civilisation,  and 
one  of  the  principal  preoccupations  of  the  European 
mind. 

Whence  come  these  vast  riches  and  whither  do  they 
go?  How  is  it  that  America  can  grow  rich  .so  much 
faster  than  Europe?  Is  it  thanks  to  far  more  fortunate 
physical  conditions,  wliich  bear  no  relation  to  the  deserts 
of  man?  Or  is  it  in  consequence  of  moral  and  intellec- 
tual qualities  which  are  lacking  in  Europeans?  And 
what  will  be  the  ultimate  effect  of  this  economic  supe- 
riority? Riches  may  be  the  goal  of  an  individual's 
efforts;  for  a  nation  they  can  only  be  means  to  conquer 
the  other  good  things  of  life  which  we  call  civiHsation: 
glory,  grandeur,  power,  beauty,  knowledge,  moral 
refinement.  Can  America,  and  will  she,  make  use  of 
her  riches  to  rob  Europe  of  the  intellectual  and  moral 
leadership  which  the  latter  still  possesses?  Or  will  these 
riches,  too  swiftly  won,  exercise  an  evil  influence  simul- 
taneously upon  Europe  and  America,  by  making  both 
continents  more  materialistic? 

Such  is  the  riddle  of  America,  which,  for  some  time 
past,  has  been  steadily  forcing  itself  upon  the  attention  of 
Europe.  To  arrive  at  an  answer,  we  must  know  whether 
the  influence  of  a  too  swift  economic  development  of 
the  New  World  upon  the  higher  activities  of  the  mind, 
upon  morals,  upon  science,  art,  and  religion  is  beneficial 
or  the  reverse.  The  detractors  of  America — and  there 
arc  many  of  them  in  Europe — affirm  without  hesitation 


The  Riddle  of  America  227 

that  the  Americans  arc  barbarians  laden  with  gold;  that 
they  think  on]}'  of  making  money,  and  that,  in  conse- 
c]uencc  of  their  riches,  they  lower  the  level  of  Europe's 
ancient  civilisation  and  infect  its  beautiful  traditions 
with  a  crass  materialism.  Admirers  of  America,  on 
the  contrary- — and  of  these  there  are  as  many  in  Europe 
as  there  are  detractors — will  tell  you  that  the  New 
World  is  giving  to  the  Old  a  unique  example  of  energy, 
activity,  intelligence,  and  daring.  Let  old  Europe  then 
give  heed;  beyond  the  Atlantic,  young  rivals  are  girding 
themselves  with  new  weapons  to  dispute  with  her  the 
superiority  of  which  she  is  proud.  What  must  one 
think  of  these  conflicting  answers  to  the  puzzle? 

Let  us  begin  with  the  reasoning  of  the  detractors: 
"Americans  are  barbarians  laden  with  gold.  "  In  order 
to  simplify  the  discussion,  let  us  limit  our  examination 
to  the  United  States,  which  is  justly  entitled  to  repre- 
sent contemporary  America  with  all  its  qualities  and 
all  its  defects.  Xo  long  sojourn  within  the  borders  of 
the  United  States  is  necessary  to  convince  a  person  that 
in  the  great  Republic  people  think  only  of  making 
money.  A  writer  partial  to  paradox  might  well  amuse 
himself  v.ith  proving  that  the  Americans  are  more 
idealistic  than  the  Europeans,  or  even  that  they  are  a 
mystical  jjcople.  Anyone  who  cares  to  find  arguments 
to  establish  this  thesis  may  well  be  embarrassed  by 
their  number.  Eor  instance,  would  a  people  which  de- 
spised the  higher  activities  of  the  mind  have  been  able 
to  create   the  philosopliical  doctrine  which  is  popularly 


228  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

known  to  us  under  the  name  of  "Pragmatism"?  The 
Pragmatist  affirms  that  all  ideas  capable  of  rendering 
useful  service  are  true.  He  takes  utility  as  his  standard 
of  the  measure  of  truth.  This  theory  has  seemed  to 
many  writers  of  the  Old  World  a  decisive  proof  of  the 
practical  mind  of  the  American  people,  who  never  forget 
their  material  interests,  even  in  connection  with  meta- 
physical questions.  This,  however,  is  a  mistake. 
Pragmatism  does  not  propose  to  subordinate  the  ideal  to 
practical  interest.  Its  purpose  is  to  reconcile  opposing 
doctrines  by  proving  that  all  ideas,  even  those  which 
seem  mutually  exclusive,  can  help  us  to  become  wiser, 
stronger,  better.  What  service  is  there  then  in  strug- 
gling to  make  one  idea  triumph  over  another  instead  of 
allowing  men  to  draw  from  each  idea  the  good  which 
each  can  yield?  In  a  word.  Pragmatism,  as  America 
has  conceived  it,  is  a  mighty  effort  to  give  the  right  of 
expression  in  modern  civilisation  to  all  religious  and 
philosophical  doctrines  which  in  the  past  have  stained 
the  world  with  their  sanguinary  struggles. 

A  beautiful  doctrine  this,  which  may  lend  itself  to 
many  objections;  but  true  or  false,  it  proves  that  the 
people  who  have  conceived  it,  far  from  despising  the 
ideal,  have  such  respect  for  all  ideas  and  all  beliefs,  that 
they  have  not  the  courage  to  repel  a  single  one.  Such 
a  people  wishes  to  learn  all  and  understand  all. 

Another  proof  of  this  same  characteristic  is  furnished 
by  American  universities.  Europeans  have  all  heard 
descriptions    of    these    great    American    universities, 


The  Riddle  of  America  229 

Harvard  and  Columbia,  for  example.  They  are  true 
cities  of  learning  with  vast  and  splendid  buildings, 
gardens,  pavilions,  laboratories,  museums,  libraries, 
athletic  fields  for  physical  exercises,  pools  where 
students  can  go  to  swim.  They  are  enormously  rich 
and,  at  the  same  time,  always  in  dire  straits.  How  can 
that  be?  Because  no  speciality  or  item  of  perfection  is 
allowed  to  be  lacking.  All  the  languages  and  the 
literatures  of  the  world  which  have  reached  any  degree  of 
importance,  all  the  histories,  all  the  sciences, — judicial, 
social,  moral,  physical,  natural, — all  the  divisions  of 
mathematics,  and  all  the  philosophies,  are  taught  there 
by  hundreds  of  professors.  Private  citizens  of  the  rich 
classes,  bankers,  manufacturers,  merchants,  have  in  a 
great  degree  met  from  their  private  purses  the  steadily 
growing  needs  of  the  universities. 

There  is  the  same  tendency  in  art.  That  American 
cities  are  ugly,  I  willingly  admit.  It  would  need  much 
courage,  no  doubt,  to  brand  this  affirmation  as  false, 
but  it  would  also  be  unjust  to  deny  that  America  is 
making  mighty  efforts  to  beautif}^  her  cities.  All  the 
schools  of  architecture  in  Europe,  especially  that  of 
Paris,  are  full  of  Americans  hard  at  work.  The  sums 
which  cities,  states,  banks,  insurance  companies, 
universities,  and  railroads,  have  spent  in  beautifying 
their  magnificent  edifices  is  fabulous.  Not  all  these 
buildings,  by  any  means,  are  masterpieces,  but  there  are 
many  which  are  very  beautiful.  America  has  architects 
of  indisputable  worth.     In  Europe,  men  like  to  repeat 


230  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

that  Americans  buy  at  extravagant  prices  objects  of 
ancient  art,  or  things  that  pass  for  such,  not  distin- 
guishing those  which  are  beautiful  and  ancient  from 
those  which  are  inferior  and  counterfeit.  But  those  who 
have  seen  something  of  the  houses  of  rich  Americans 
know  that,  although  there  are  snobs  and  dupes  in 
America,  as  everywhere  else,  there  are  also  people  who 
know  the  meaning  of  art,  who  know  how  to  buy  beautiful 
things,  and  who  search  the  world  over  for  them.  You 
will  find  in  the  streets  of  New  York  every  variety  of 
architecture,  just  as  you  find  in  its  libraries  all  the 
literatures  of  the  world,  and  in  its  theatres  all  the  music, 
and  in  its  houses  all  the  decorative  arts. 

"The  barbarian  laden  with  gold "  is,  then,  a  legendary 
personage,  but  it  is  not  at  all  surprising  that  such  a 
conception  should  exist.  Modern  society  is  organised 
in  such  fashion  that  it  is  impossible  even  to  conceive  of 
a  people  at  once  rich  and  ignorant.  Industry,  business, 
agriculture,  demand  nowadays  very  special  technical 
knowledge,  and  a  very  complete  social  organisation; 
that  is  to  say,  they  imply  a  scientific,  political,  and 
judicial  civilisation  of  a  reasonably  high  order.  Thus 
America  is  not  at  all  uninterested  in  the  higher  activi- 
ties of  the  mind.  It  would  be  more  just  to  say  that  as 
a  nation,  and  without  regard  to  individual  instances,  she 
interests  herself  in  such  activities  less  than  in  industry, 
in  business,  and  in  agriculture.  But  is  not  this  also  the 
case  with  Europe?  Who  would  dare  affirm  that  the 
progress  of  the  arts  and  sciences  and  letters  is  at  this 


The  Riddle  of  America  231 

moment  the  principal  concern  of  the  governments  and 
of  the  influential  classes  of  the  Old  Vforld?  We  Euro- 
peans have  only  to  listen  to  what  people  round  about 
us  are  saying.  Their  talk  is  all  of  bringing  the  cultiva- 
tion of  the  land  to  economic  perfection,  of  opening  coal 
and  iron  mines,  of  harnessing  waterfalls,  of  developing 
industries,  of  increasing  exports.  Kings  who  rule  "by 
the  grace  of  God"  publicly  declare  that  nothing  inter- 
ests them  so  much  as  the  business  of  their  countries! 
If  all  this  were  characteristic  only  of  American  bar- 
barism, we  should  be  obliged  to  admit  that  Europe  is 
Americanising  herself  with  disconcerting  rapidity.  But 
this  economic  effort  of  Europe  in  turn  presents  nothing 
that  need  surprise  us;  like  the  American  development, 
it  is  onh*  the  dizzy  acceleration  of  a  vast  historic  move- 
ment whose  beginnings  go  back  to  the  far  distant  day 
when  an  obscure  and  obstinate  Genoese  set  sail,  and  in 
the  midst  of  the  waters  of  the  Atlantic  crossed  the 
impassable  boundary'  of  the  Old  World.  Yes,  before 
that  day,  Europe  had  created  admirable  arts  and  litera- 
tures, profound  philosophies,  consoling  religions,  lofty 
morals,  wise  systems  of  justice,  but — she  was  poor. 
She  produced  httlc,  and  produced  it  slowly;  she  had 
defied  tradition  and  authority;  she  had  fettered  human 
energy  by  a  multitude  of  laws,  precepts,  and  prejudices. 
To  humble  men's  pride,  she  kept  repeating  to  them  that 
they  were  feeble  and  corrupt  creatures.  She  taught 
them  to  use  Virgil's  beautiful  figure  that  they  were  like 
"a  rower  who  painfully  forces  his  boat    against    the 


232  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

current  of  the  stream.  Evil  be  on  his  head  if  for  one 
instant  he  forgets,  and  ceases  to  struggle  against  the 
current's  force;  in  that  moment,  he  is  lost;  the  flood 
sweeps  away  his  fragile  boat. " 

One  fine  day,  however,  Europe  discovered  a  vast 
continent  in  the  midst  of  the  ocean.  Then  it  dawned 
upon  her  that  Prometheus  had  been  but  a  clumsy  thief, 
for  he  had  stolen  only  a  tiny  spark  of  fire ;  she  discovered 
mines,  coal,  and  electricity.  She  created  the  steam- 
engine  and  all  the  other  machines  which  have  been 
derived  from  it.  She  succeeded  in  multiplying  riches 
with  a  rapidity  unimagined  by  remoter  ancestors. 
From  that  moment,  man  no  longer  contented  himself 
with  dreaming  of  the  Promised  Land.  He  wished  to  go 
there.  He  destroyed  all  the  traditions,  the  laws,  and 
institutions  which  place  limitations  upon  the  store  of 
human  energy.  He  learned  to  work  swiftly.  At  a 
single  stroke,  he  conquered  liberty  and  riches,  and  he 
conceived  the  idea  of  progress.  If  America  seems  to- 
day to  symbolise  this  movement,  which  has  turned  the 
world  topsy-turvy,  the  movement  was  derived  from 
Europe.  After  having  conceived  the  idea  of  such  a 
revolution,  could  Europe  remain  untouched  by  it? 

It  would  appear  then  that  the  riddle  of  America  is 
very  simple.  The  answer  contains  nothing  to  make  us 
uneasy.  The  riches  of  the  New  World  threaten  no 
catastrophe  to  the  noblest  traditions  of  our  civilisation. 
For  New  York's  wealth  is  only  a  part  of  the  riches 


The  Riddle  of  America  233 

produced  in  the  same  economic  development  in  the 
two  worlds.  The  ultimate  development  of  these 
mighty  riches  might  be  merely  a  general  advance,  both 
material  and  ideal,  of  Europe  and  America.  Rich  and 
prosperous  Americans  might  try  to  assimilate  the  cul- 
ture of  Europe,  and  on  her  part  Europe,  in  her  effort  to 
increase  her  own  riches,  might  seek  to  equal  America. 
But  a  historian  of  antiquity  who  returns  from  America 
cannot  share  this  optimism.  In  the  lap  of  modern 
civilisation,  there  are  twin  worlds  struggling  with  each 
other  for  leadership.  But  these  two  worlds  are  not,  as 
people  are  apt  to  think,  Europe  and  America.  Their 
names  are  Quality  and  Quantity. 

The  civilisations  from  which  our  own  is  sprung  were 
poor  indeed.  They  set  limits  to  their  desires,  their 
ambitions,  their  spirit  of  initiative,  their  audacity,  their 
originality.  They  brought  forth  slowly  and  a  little  at  a 
time,  and  suffered  continuously  from  the  insufficiency 
of  their  material  resources.  They  looked  upon  the 
amassing  of  wealth  merely  as  a  painful  necessity;  but, 
in  all  things,  they  sought  to  attain  the  difficult  model  of 
perfection,  whether  in  art,  or  in  literature,  or  in  the 
realms  of  morality  and  religion.  The  aristocratic 
character  of  almost  all  the  industries  of  the  past,  the 
importance  which  was  formerly  bestowed  on  the  decora- 
tive arts  and  on  all  questions  of  personal  morality, 
ceremonial,  and  form — these  are  all  proofs  of  it.  It  was 
Quality,  not  Quantity,  which  carried  our  forefathers 
forward.     All  the  limitations  to  which  these  civilisations 


234  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

were  subject,  so  astonishing  to  us  to-day,  were  only  the 
necessary  cost  of  these  perfections  which  men  once  so 
ardently  desired.  We  have  turned  upside  down  the 
world  our  ancestors  lived  in.  We  have  made  our  goal 
the  multiplication  of  riches.  We  have  won  liberty, 
but  we  have  been  obliged  to  abandon  almost  all  the 
ancient  ideals  of  perfection,  sacrificing  Quality  in 
everything. 

How  many  of  the  difficulties  which  torture  this 
brilliant  period  of  ours  so  cruelly  are  the  result  of  this 
duel  between  Quality  and  Quantity !  Look,  for  example, 
at  the  present  crisis  in  the  study  of  the  classics.  Why 
did  men  formerly  study  Homer  and  Cicero  with  passion- 
ate zeal?  Because,  in  those  days,  the  great  Greek  and 
Latin  writers  were  the  models  of  that  literary  perfection, 
so  greatly  admired  by  the  influential  classes,  which  was 
not  merely  an  ornament  of  the  mind.  The  attainment 
of  perfection  often  carried  with  it  the  admiration  of  the 
public,  fame,  sometimes  even  glory  and  high  rank. 
In  this  last  century,  however,  these  models  have  lost 
much  of  their  prestige,  either  on  account  of  the  multi- 
tude of  literatures  wh.ich  have  come  to  be  known  and 
liked,  or  because  they  have  proved  troublesome  to  a 
period  comj^elled  to  write  too  much  and  too  quickly. 
Just  imagine  a  candidate  for  the  presidency  of  the 
United  States  who  should  x^ronouncc  ten  or  fifteen  long 
orations  daily  and  who  should  in  enc-h  discourse  show 
himself  the  perfect  orator  according  to  the  rules  of 
Cicero  or  Quintilian!     The  day  when  classical  culture 


The  Riddle  of  America  235 

ceased  to  be  an  official  school  of  literary  taste,  on  that 
day  it  was  condemned  to  die;  and  scientific  philology, 
which  we  have  sought  to  set  up  in  its  place,  can  only 
serve  to  bury  its  corpse.  No  longer  models  for  pos- 
terit}^  the  books  of  the  ancient  authors  have  be- 
come like  any  others,  and  are  less  interesting  for 
the  majority  of  readers  than  the  works  of  modem 
literatures. 

It  is  the  fashion  nowadays  to  discuss  the  crisis  which 
threatens  all  the  arts.  We  must,  however,  remember  to 
preserve  a  distinction.  We  must  divide  the  arts  into 
two  categories:  those  which  serve  to  amuse  men  by 
helping  them  to  pass  the  time  agreeably,  like  music, 
the  theatre,  and,  to  a  certain  degree,  literature;  and 
those  which  serve  to  beautify  the  world,  like  architec- 
ture, sculpture,  painting,  and  all  the  decorative  arts. 
It  is  patent  that  the  crisis  which  we  are  considering  is 
much  more  serious  among  the  arts  embraced  by  the 
second  category.  No  epoch  has  spent  so  much  money 
in  beautifying  the  world  as  has  our  own;  no  age  has 
supported  so  formidable  an  army  of  architects,  sculp- 
tors, decorators,  and  cabinet-makers;  no  age  has  built 
so  many  cities,  palaces,  monuments,  bridges,  plazas, 
and  gardens.  In  the  midst  of  lavish  plenty,  why  are 
we  so  discontented  with  the  results  obtained;  why  have 
not  Americans,  in  view  of  the  enormous  sums  which 
they  have  spent  to  beautify  their  cities,  succeeded  in 
building  a  St.  Alark's  or  a  Notre  Dame?  They  have  all 
the    materials, — money,    artists,    the    desire    to   create 


236  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

beautiful  things.  What  then  do  they  lack?  They 
lack  one  single  thing — time. 

One  day,  in  New  York,  I  was  praising  an  example 
of  American  architecture  to  an  American  architect  of 
great  talent.  "Yes,  yes,"  he  answered  with  a  touch 
of  satire,  "my  fellow  countrymen  would  willingly  spend 
a  hundred  million  dollars  to  build  a  church  as  beauti- 
ful as  St.  Mark's  in  Venice,  but  they  would  command 
me,  as  a  condition  of  my  undertaking  the  work,  to 
finish  it  within  eighteen  months." 

That  is  a  significant  phrase.  How  is  it  possible  to 
beautify  a  world  which  is  incessantly  in  transformation, 
wherein  nothing  is  stable,  and  which  wishes  to  multiply 
everything  it  possesses — buildings,  as  it  would  furni- 
ture? To  create  beautiful  palaces,  to  construct  beauti- 
ful furniture,  to  attain  the  distant  ideal  of  perfection, 
time  is  essential — time  and  wise  deliberation,  reasona- 
ble limitation  of  the  multiplicity  of  human  demands, 
and  a  certain  stability  in  taste.  No  one  could  have 
built  St.  Mark's  or  Notre  Dame  in  eighteen  months, 
and  France  could  not  have  created  her  famous  decora- 
tive styles  of  the  eighteenth  century  if  public  taste  had 
been  so  fickle  as  ours,  and  if  everybody  at  that  time 
had  wished  every  ten  years  to  change  his  furniture. 

The  crises  in  classical  studies  and  in  the  decorative 
arts  are,  however,  still  relatively  slight  in  comparison 
with  the  general  intellectual  and  moral  confusion  into 
which  the  doctrine  of  Quantity  has  plunged  men's 
minds,  by  substituting  a  standard  of  Quantity  in  place 


The  Riddle  of  America  237 

of  the  traditional  standard  of  Quality.  If  my  phrase  is 
obscure,  examples  may  possibly  elucidate  what  I  say. 
We  all  know,  for  instance,  that,  in  recent  years,  the  citi- 
zens of  the  United  States  have  waged  a  bitter  campaign 
against  the  trusts,  the  great  banks,  the  railroads,  and 
insurance  companies;  in  fact,  against  all  the  vast  powers 
of  money.  In  newspaper  articles,  in  public  speeches, 
and  in  whole  volumes  filled  with  accusations,  these  trusts 
have  been  charged  with  being  centres  of  corruption, 
instruments  of  a  new  despotism  not  less  odious  than  the 
political  despotism  of  old.  They  are  decried  as  scan- 
dalous conspiracies  to  despoil  honest  men  of  the  le- 
gitimate fruits  of  their  labour.  The  campaign  has 
penetrated  to  the  very  heart  of  the  nation;  but  in  the 
face  of  the  enormous  indignation  of  the  masses,  there 
has  been  exhibited  both  in  America  and  Europe  the 
Olympian  calm  of  economists  and  men  of  great  affairs, 
who  have  denounced  this  movement  of  protest  as  a  re- 
turn to  Mediaeval  ideas,  and  who  in  the  face  of  a  vast 
outcry  have  paid  enthusiastic  homage  to  modern 
finance,  its  enormous  enterprises,  and  its  tremendous 
organisation. 

How  can  there  be  so  vast  a  difference  of  opinion  in 
an  age  so  intelligent  and  educated  as  ours?  Is  half  the 
world  struck  blind  to-day,  and  is  sight  given  to  the 
other  half  alone?  No,  there  is  neither  incurable  blind- 
ness, nor  sight  vouchsafed  only  to  a  few.  The  sole 
reason  for  the  confusion  is  that  men  employ  different 
standards  in  measuring  the  same  thing,  and  for  this 


238  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

reason  find  it  impossible  to  understand  each  other.  If 
one  accepts  the  quantitative  standard,  if  one  admits 
that  the  supreme  object  of  Hfe  is  to  produce  an  enor- 
mous pile  of  riches  as  rapidly  as  possible,  the  economists 
are  right.  The  injustices  and  cruelties  denounced  by 
the  adversaries  of  high  finance  are  merely  negligible 
inconveniences  in  a  regime  of  economic  liberty  of  which 
the  modern  world  is  naturally  proud,  for  it  is  to  this 
liberty  that  the  modern  world  owes  most  of  its  wealth. 
Yet  we  must  remember  that  the  idea  of  leaving  the 
wages  of  each  individual  to  be  determined  by  the 
blind  play  of  economic  forces  was  foreign  to  all  the 
civilisations  that  preceded  our  own.  They  always 
sought  to  correct  the  principles  of  business  in  order  to 
keep  them  in  accord  with  the  principles  of  charity  and 
justice.  To  carry  out  this  policy,  they  did  not  even 
hesitate  to  limit  the  development  of  industry  and 
business,  for  example,  by  forbidding  interest  on  money. 
Former  ages  subordinated  economic  development  to  an 
ideal  of  moral  perfection;  they  placed  Quality  above 
Quantity.  If,  however,  one  applies  this  standard  of 
qualitative  measure  to  the  modern  world,  it  is  these 
detractors  of  high  finance  who  have  the  right  on  their 
side.  Many  methods  employed  by  modern  finance, 
useful  as  they  are  from  an  economic  point  of  view,  are 
for  the  above-mentioned  reason  none  the  less  repugnant 
to  a  moral  and  slightly  sensitive  conscience.  Detrac- 
tors and  defenders  may  dispute  to  the  end  of  time. 
They  will  never  understand  each  other,  for  they  start 


The  Riddle  of  America  239 

from  different  premises,  whieh  never  can  be  reconciled 
to  each  other. 

It  is  this  continual  confusion  between  quantitative 
and  qualitative  standards  which  prevents  the  modern 
world  from  steering  a  true  course  amid  the  gra\'est 
moral  questions.  Take,  for  example,  the  question  of 
progress.  Is  there  an  idea  more  popular  to-day,  or  a 
word  more  often  rejjcated,  than  "progress"?  And  yet 
if  to  every  person  who  jjronounces  this  word  we  were  to 
put  the  c[uestion,  "What  do  you  mean  by  progress?" 
few  indeed  would  be  able  to  answer  with  precision. 
There  is  a  thing  still  stranger.  In  this  century  of 
progress,  the  whole  world  deplores  ten  times  a  day  the 
decadence  of  all  things.  How  can  such  a  contradiction 
be  explained?  The  answer  is  simply  that  the  same  act 
may  be  judged  as  a  phenomenon  of  progress  or  of 
decadence,  according  as  it  is  viewed  from  the  standpoint 
of  Quality  or  of  Quantity.  Set  an  architect  and  a 
locomotive  builder  to  disputing  about  the  modern 
world.  The  former  will  maintain  that  the  world  is 
reverting  to  barbarism  because  it  multiplies  cities,  and 
hastily  and  hideously  constructed  villages  without 
being  able  to  create  a  single  one  of  those  marvellous 
monuments  which  are  the  glory  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
The  latter  will  reply  that  the  world  moves  forward, 
because  the  population,  number,  and  size  of  the  cities, 
the  amount  of  cultivated  land,  the  extension  of  rail- 
roads, increase  without  ccssatio!i.  The  interlocutors 
will  never  come  to  understand  each  other,  just  as  two 


240  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

men  who  look  at  the  world  through  spectacles  of  differ- 
ent colours  can  never  agree  on  the  colour  of  their  en- 
vironment. The  riddle  of  America,  which  for  some  time 
past  has  bothered  Europe  so  much,  is  merely  another 
example  of  this  permanent  confusion  of  standards  which 
characterises  the  age  in  which  we  live. 

America  is  neither  the  monstrous  country  where  men 
think  solely  of  making  money,  nor  the  country  of  mar- 
vels boasted  by  her  admirers.  It  is  the  country  where 
the  principles  of  Quantity,  which  have  become  so 
powerful  during  the  last  one  hundred  and  fifty  years, 
have  achieved  their  most  extraordinary  triumph.  An 
active,  energetic,  vigorous  nation  has  found  itself 
master  of  an  enormous  territory,  portions  of  which  were 
very  fertile  and  other  portions  very  rich  in  mines  and 
forests,  at  the  very  moment  when  our  civilisation  finally 
invented  the  machine  which  makes  possible  the  ex- 
ploitation of  vast  countries  and  the  swift  creation  of 
wealth:  the  steam-engine. 

Less  cumbered  by  old  traditions  than  the  elder 
nations,  and  with  a  vast  continent  in  front  of  her, 
America  has  marched  along  the  new  roads  of  history 
with  a  rapidity  and  an  energy  for  which  there  is  no 
precedent.  Ten,  fifteen,  thirty  times  in  a  single  cen- 
tury has  she  multiplied  her  population,  her  cities,  and 
all  the  wealth  coveted  by  man.  She  has  created,  in 
careless  and  prodigal  profusion,  a  society  which  has 
subordinated  all  former  ideas  of  perfection  to  a  new 


The  Riddle  of  America  241 

ideal;  ever  building  on  a  grander  scale  and  ever  building 
more  swiftly.  No,  it  is  not  true  that  America  is  in- 
different to  the  higher  activities  of  mind,  but  the  effort 
which  she  spends  upon  the  arts  and  sciences  is,  and  will 
long  remain,  subordinate  to  the  great  historic  task  of 
the  United  States,  the  intensive  cultivation  of  a  huge 
continent.  Intellectual  things  will  remain  subordinate, 
all  hough  very  many  Americans  of  the  upper  classes 
would  wish  that  it  were  otherwise. 

In  just  the  same  way,  it  is  not  accurate  to  say  that, 
in  contrast  to  American  barbarism,  Europe  reaps  the 
harvest  of  civilisation ;  just  as  it  would  be  unfair  to  say 
that  the  Old  World  is  done  for,  exhausted  by  its  petrify- 
ing, inevitable  routine.  The  ancient  societies  of  Europe 
have  likewise  entered  into  the  quantitative  phase  of 
civilisation.  The  new  demon  has  also  got  hold  ot  them. 
In  Europe,  as  well  as  in  America,  the  masses  of  people 
long  for  a  more  comfortable  existence;  public  and  pri- 
vate expenses  pile  up  with  bewildering  speed.  Thus 
in  the  Old  World  also  the  production  of  wealth  must  be 
increased,  but  this  enterprise  is  far  more  difficult  in 
Europe  than  in  America.  The  population  of  Europe  is 
much  more  dense  than  that  of  the  New  World;  a  portion 
of  its  lands  is  exhausted;  the  great  number  of  political 
subdivisions  and  the  multiplicity  of  tongues  increase 
enormously  the  difficulties  of  conducting  business  on  a 
great  scale.  Traditions  handed  down  from  the  time 
when  men  toiled  to  produce  slowiy  and  in  small  quanti- 
ties things  shaped  toward  a  far-distant  ideal  of  perfec- 
16 


242  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

tion  are  still  strong  among  its  people.  Europe,  then, 
has  the  advantage  over  America  in  the  higher  activities 
of  the  mind,  but  she  cannot  help  being  more  timid, 
more  sluggish,  and  more  limited  in  her  economic 
enterprises.  America  and  Europe  may  each  be  judged 
superior  or  inferior  to  the  other  according  as  the  critic 
takes  for  his  standard  the  criteria  of  Quality  or  of 
Quantity.  If  a  civilisation  approximates  perfection  in 
proportion  to  the  rapidity  with  which  she  produced 
riches,  America  is  the  model  to  be  followed;  if,  on  the 
contrary,  perfection  is  expressed  by  the  measure  of  the 
higher  activities  of  the  spirit,  Europe  leads  the  way. 

The  riddle,  then,  seems  solved,  but  the  reader  may 
object  that  it  is  solved  only  by  admitting  that  we  dwell 
in  a  perpetual  condition  of  misunderstanding;  that  the 
modern  world  is  a  sort  of  Tower  of  Babel  where  men 
speak  a  tongue  which  others  cannot  understand.  If 
this  agreeable  news  were  the  only  thing  brought  back 
by  the  historian  of  antiquity  from  his  two  voyages  to 
America,  he  might  better  perhaps  have  spared  himself 
the  trouble!  Such  might  well  be  the  conclusion  of  this 
long  argument!  Nevertheless,  it  is  indisputable  that 
the  modern  world  demands  two  contradictory  things, 
speed  and  perfection.  We  wish  to  conquer  the  earth 
and  its  treasures  with  all  possible  haste.  To  this  end, 
we  have  created  tremendous  machinery  and  have 
uncovered  new  forces  in  nature.  It  is  a  huge  task,  no 
doubt,  but  to  accomplish  it  we  must  renounce  almost 


The  Riddle  of  America  243 

all  the  artistic  and  moral  perfections  which  used  to  be 
at  once  the  torment  and  joy  and  pride  of  our  forefathers. 
It  is  a  painful  necessity  indeed,  against  which  our  age 
revolts,  and  from  which  it  seeks  in  vain  every  possible 
channel  of  escape. 

Let  us  strip  ofT  the  last  shred  of  illusion.  Deteriora- 
tion must  ever  continue  amongst  the  ideals  of  perfection 
which  our  ancestors  worshipped,  so  long  as  population 
multiplies  and  the  demands  and  aspirations  of  all 
classes,  as  well  as  all  expenses,  public  and  private, 
continue  to  increase  on  the  scale  and  with  the  momen- 
tum with  which  they  are  increasing  at  this  moment. 
Even  if  this  formidable  revolution  should  slacken  a 
trifle,  the  ideal  of  Quantity  must  spread  its  empire  over 
the  earth,  morality  and  beauty  must  of  necessity  be 
subordinated  to  the  prime  necessities  of  constructing 
machines  ever  increasing  in  speed  and  power,  of  expand- 
ing cultivated  land,  and  of  working  new  mines.  Art, 
like  industry,  agriculture,  like  literature,  will  be  com- 
pelled to  increase  their  production  to  the  continuous 
deterioration  of  their  quality,  and  our  secret  discontent 
will  grow  in  proportion  as  our  triumphs  increase.  Un- 
able ourselves  to  decide  between  Quality  and  Quantity, 
we  shall  never  know^  whether  the  great  drama  of  the 
world  at  which  we  are  looking  is  a  marvellous  epoch  of 
progress  or  a  melancholy  tragedy  of  decadence. 

From  this  singular  situation,  there  is  only  one  possible 
w:i}'  of  escape;  a  method  which  has  no  precedent  in 
the  world's  history.     It  is  that  very  method,  however, 


244  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

which  men  will  not  hear  spoken  of.  It  would  be  ab- 
solutely essential  to  create  a  movement  of  public  opin- 
ion through  religious,  political,  or  moral  means,  which 
should  impose  upon  the  world  a  reasonable  limit  to  its 
desires.  To  the  age  in  which  we  live,  it  seems  impossible 
to  express  an  idea  seemingly  more  absurd  than  this. 
The  material  situation  of  every  one  of  us  is  to-day 
bound  up  with  this  formidable  movement,  which  drives 
men  ceaselessly  to  increase  the  making  and  spending  of 
wealth.  Think  what  an  economic  crisis  there  would  be 
if  this  movement  were  to  slow  down.  All  the  moral 
systems  which  governed  the  world  down  to  the  French 
Revolution  forced  upon  men  the  belief  that  they  would 
grow  more  perfect  as  they  grew  simpler.  When  reli- 
gion and  custom  were  not  sufficient  to  teach  men  to  set 
limits  to  their  needs  and  desires,  then  these  old  moral 
systems  had  recourse  to  sumptuary  laws.  In  direct 
contrast  to  this,  the  nineteenth  century  affirms  that 
man  grows  more  perfect  in  proportion  as  he  produces 
and  consumes.  So  confusing  are  the  definitions  of 
legitimate  desires  and  vices,  of  reasonable  expenses  and 
inordinate  luxury,  that  in  this  century  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  differentiate  between  the  one  and  the 
other. 

A  vast  revolution  has  been  brought  into  being,  the 
greatest,  perhaps,  which  history  can  show;  but  if  the 
new  principles  which  our  century  has  borne  to  the  front 
should  be  developed  until  they  insured  the  ultimate  and 
supreme  triumph  of  Quantity,  would  it  be  possible  to 


The  Riddle  of  America  245 

escape  what  would  amount  to  the  demolition  of  the 
whole  fabric  of  the  glorious  civilisation  bequeathed  to 
us  by  the  centuries;  religious  doctrines  and  the  prin- 
ciples upon  which  morality  is  based,  as  well  as  all  the 
traditions  of  the  arts? 

History'  knows  better  than  do  we  the  dusky  roads  of 
the  future,  and  it  is  idle  for  us  to  wish  to  see  the  way 
along  them ;  but  in  spite  of  our  ignorance  of  the  future, 
we  have  duties  toward  the  past  and  toward  ourselves, 
and  is  it  not  one  of  these  duties  to  call  the  attention  of 
our  generation  to  the  possibility  of  this  catastrophe, 
even  if,  our  generation  likes  to  turn  its  face  away  from 
it?  Very  often  during  my  travels  in  America,  I  used 
to  ask  myself  whether  men  of  various  intellectual  inter- 
ests might  not  find  in  this  duty  something  to  strengthen 
their  conscience  for  the  part  which  they  must  play  in 
the  world. 

If  we  except  medicine,  which  aims  to  cure  our  bodily 
ills,  those  sciences  which  are  concerned  with  discoveries 
useful  to  industry,  and  those  arts  which  entertain  the 
public,  all  other  branches  of  intellectual  activit}-  are 
to-day  in  dire  confusion.  Is  there  a  pious  clergyman 
who  has  not  asked  himself  in  moments  of  discourage- 
ment what  good  it  is  to  preach  the  virtues  of  the  Christ- 
ian faith  in  a  century  whose  dynamic  power  springs 
from  an  exaltation  of  pride  and  an  emancipation  of 
passion  which  amount  almost  to  delirium.''  What 
intelligent  historian  is  there  who  does  not  now  and  then 
ask  himself  why  he  persists  in  telling  over  again  the 


246  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

events  of  the  past  to  a.  generation  which  no  longer  looks 
ahead,  and  which  rushes  violently  on  the  future,  head 
down  like  a  bull?  What  philosopher  is  there  who,  as 
he  pursues  his  transcendental  preoccupation,  does  not 
feel  himself  sometimes  hopelessly  adrift,  like  a  being 
fallen  upon  the  earth,  from  another  planet,  in  an  age 
which  no  longer  is  passionately  interested  in  anything 
except  economic  reality?  What  artist  is  there  who 
seeks  not  only  to  make  money,  but  to  reach  the  per- 
fection of  his  ideal,  who  has  not  cursed  a  thousand  times 
this  frenzied  hurly-burly  in  the  midst  of  which  we  live? 

From  time  to  time,  it  is  true,  there  seems  to  be  a 
genuine  revival  of  the  ancient  ideal;  men  suddenly 
appear  who  seem  to  interest  themselves  afresh  in  the 
progress  of  religion,  in  the  future  of  morality,  in  the 
history  of  the  past,  in  the  problems  of  metaphysics,  in 
the  artistic  records  of  civilisation  long  since  dead. 
These  are,  however,  only  passing  phenomena,  and  they 
are  not  enduring  enough  to  give  artists  and  philosophers 
the  definite  consciousness  of  playing  a  well-thought-out 
and  useful  part. 

If  all  intellectual  activities  of  to-day  tend  to  become 
either  lucrative  professions  or  government  careers;  it  is 
because  nowadays  such  careers  aim  either  at  the  acqui- 
sition of  money  or  the  attainment  of  social  position,  and 
no  longer  find  their  end  in  the  careers  themselves. 
And  yet— how  many  times  as  he  travelled  across  the 
territory  of  the  two  Americas,  watching  all  day  fields 
of  wheat  and  rye,  or  plantations  of  maize  or  coffee, 


The  Riddle  of  America  247 

extending  to  the  very  edge  of  the  solitary  horizon,  how 
many  times  has  the  historian  of  antiquity  brooded  over 
those  fragments  of  marble  wrought  b}'  the  Greeks  in 
such  perfection,  which  we  admire  in  our  museums,  and 
pondered  upon  the  fragments  of  the  great  Roman 
system  of  jurisprudence  preserved  in  the  "  Corpus 
juris/'  Did  not  the  Greeks  and  Romans  succeed  in 
reaching  this  marvellous  perfection  in  the  arts  and  laws 
because  there  came  a  time  when  they  were  willing  to 
cease  extending  the  limits  of  their  empire  over  the  earth 
and  all  the  treasures  it  contains?  Have  we  not  con- 
quered vast  deserts  with  our  railroads  just  because  we 
have  been  able  to  renounce  almost  all  the  artistic  and 
moral  perfections  which  were  the  glor}^  of  the  ancients? 
In  the  light  of  this  idea,  the  historian  felt  that  he  had 
come  to  understand  all  the  better  ancient  civilisation 
and  our  own,  and  that  his  eyes  were  able  to  pierce  more 
deeply  into  the  shadowy  depths  of  human  destiny.  A 
civilisation  which  pursues  its  desire  for  perfection 
beyond  a  certain  limit  ends  by  exhausting  its  energy  in 
the  pursuit  of  an  object  at  once  too  narrow  and  im- 
possible of  attainment.  On  the  other  hand,  a  civilisa- 
tion which  allows  itself  to  be  intoxicated  by  the  madness 
of  mere  size,  by  speed,  by  quantity,  is  destined  to  end 
in  a  new  type  of  crass  and  violent  barbarism.  But  the 
point  where  these  two  opposing  forces  of  life  find  their 
most  perfect  equilibrium  changes  continually  from  age 
to  age;  and  any  epoch  approaches  more  or  less  ne^r  this 
point  according  to  the  degree  of  activity  of  the  two 


248  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

forces  struggling  within  it.  The  artist,  the  priest,  the 
historian,  the  philosopher,  in  moments  of  discourage- 
ment, when  they  feel  themselves  assailed  by  the  tempta- 
tion to  think  only  of  a  career  or  of  money,  may  well 
find  new  strength  in  the  idea  that  each  of  them  is  work- 
ing in  his  different  way  to  preserve  an  ideal  of  perfection 
in  men's  souls — it  may  be  a  perfection  of  art  or  of 
morality,  of  the  intellect  or  of  the  spirit.  Let  them 
remember  that  this  ideal,  limited  as  it  may  seem,  serves 
as  a  dike  to  prevent  our  civilisation  from  being  en- 
gulfed in  an  overwhelming  flood  of  riches  and  from 
sinking  in  an  orgy  of  brutality.  This  task  is  so  great 
and  so  noble  that  those  who  strive  for  it  ought  surely  to 
feel  that  they  do  not  live  in  vain. 


Part  IV 
Politics   and   Justice   in    Ancient    Rome 


249 


THE  TRIAL  OF  VERRES 

TN  the  early  days  of  the  year  70  B.C.,  a  deputation 
*•  from  the  citiCvS  of  Sicily  arrived  at  Rome  and 
sought  an  interview  with  a  young  Senator,  who  was  al- 
ready famed  for  his  eloquence,  by  name  Marcus  Tullius 
Cicero.  What  could  be  the  object  of  the  Sicilians' 
visit  to  Rome  and  to  the  modest  house  of  the  young 
Senator,  whose  strict  probity  and  modest  means  made  it 
impossible  for  him  to  receive  his  visitors  in  a  sumptuous 
palace?  Justice  was  the  object  of  their  visit.  For 
three  years,  from  75  to  73  B.C.,  Sicily  had  been  governed 
by  a  young  pro-praetor,  a  scion  of  an  illustrious  house, 
who  had  powerful  friends  amongst  the  party  in  power: 
Caius  Cornelius  Verres.  Daring,  imprudent,  covetous, 
fond  of  art  and  its  products  and  of  the  pleasures  of  life, 
emboldened  by  a  rapid  and  fortunate  career,  the 
young  pro-pra^tor  had  certainly  much  abused  his 
power  in  the  provinces  and  had  too  readily  turned  to 
account  the  corrupt  notions  of  the  times  in  the  amassing 
of  a  huge  fortune  b}-^  all  the  means,  licit  and  illicit,  which 
a  pro-pra:tor  could  use  and  abuse,  though  in  doing  so 

251 


252  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

he  had  offended  the  interests  and  susceptibilities  of 
others,  and  had  made  a  great  number  of  enemies.  That 
is  the  only  conclusion  to  be  drawn  from  the  fact  that, 
after  his  departure,  the  cities,  accustomed  though  they 
were  to  insolent  and  overbearing  governors,  decided 
in  this  instance  to  present  an  indictment  and  had 
recourse  to  the  young  Senator  who  five  years  before 
had  been  quaestor  in  Sicily,  and  who  had  left  behind 
him  in  the  island  a  great  reputation  for  culture,  gener- 
osity and  honesty.  When  he  left  the  island,  this  young 
Senator  had  himself  said  to  the  Sicilians  in  a  speech 
delivered  at  Lilybceum:  "If  at  any  time  you  have 
need  of  me,  come  and  fetch  me." 

The  Sicilians  had  remembered  this  promise.  The 
laws  of  ancient  Rome  allowed  any  citizen  to  cite  in  the 
courts  any  other  citizen  whom  he  suspected  of  having 
broken  the  laws.  Would  Cicero  cite  Verres  in  Sicily's 
behalf?  The  proposal  of  the  Sicilian  cities  was  a  proof 
of  remarkable  confidence,  but  it  was  at  the  same  time 
a  dangerous  honour.  Verres  was  a  rich  m^an;  he  was 
powerful  and  had  any  number  of  helpers  and  supporters 
among  the  party  in  power.  Of  even  greater  assistance 
to  Verres  than  the  friendship  of  the  influential  was  the 
feeling  of  community  of  interest  amongst  the  dominant 
faction.  This  faction  was  the  faction  of  Sulla,  that  is 
to  say,  the  more  conservative  portion  of  the  nobility, 
which,  after  a  terrible  civil  war  waged  against  the 
Democratic  party,  had  succeeded  in  seizing  the  reins 
of   government   of   the   Republic.     It    was   a   faction 


The  Trial  of  V^crrcs  253 

composed  of  widely  differing  ingredients.  It  comprised 
not  a  few  honourable  and  upright  men,  who  would 
naturally  wish  the  provinces  to  be  governed  humanely 
and  uprightly.  But  great  though  the  desire  might  be 
that  the  Empire  should  be  governed  well,  still  greater 
was  the  desire  to  preserve,  together  with  the  constitu- 
tion imposed  by  Sulla  on  the  Empire,  the  power  be- 
queathed by  him.  At  this  juncture,  the  opposite  party 
had  been  conquered  but  not  destroyed,  and  its  survivors 
were  restlessly  alert  for  every  opportunity  of  injuring 
the  dominant  faction  with  all  the  arms  provided  by  the 
constitution,  amongst  which  one  of  the  most  dangerous 
was  precisely  the  initiation  of  scandalous  charges 
against  prominent  persons.  Consequently,  legal  pro- 
ceedings and  scandals  intended  to  discredit  the  State 
had,  since  Sulla's  time,  been  looked  on  with  much 
disfavour  by  the  dominant  party,  even  honourable 
members  of  which,  faced  with  the  choice  between  the 
harm  which  one  of  these  processes  caused  to  the  party 
and  to  the  authorit}'  of  the  State  and  the  injury  to 
justice  resulting  from,  the  escape  of  a  powerful  culprit 
unpunished,  nearly  always  preferred  the  second. 

In  fact,  for  years  past,  the  dominant  party  had 
strained  every  nerve  to  prevent  these  processes,  thus 
encouraging  the  less  honourable  governors  to  abuse 
their  authority.  The  result  had  been  the  rise  in  the 
public  conscience  of  a  feeling  of  uneasiness,  discontent, 
and  irritation,  which  the  stories,  often  exaggerated,  of 
the  cruelty  and  violence  of  the  governors  served  only 


254  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

to  accentuate.  And  by  none  at  that  moment  was  this 
uneasiness  more  acutely  felt  than  by  Cicero.  Cicero 
belonged  to  a  family  of  equestrian  rank — middle-class 
we  should  call  it — from  Arpino.  He  was  a  homo  novus, 
a  self-made  man,  to  use  a  modern  expression,  because 
he  was  the  first  of  the  family  to  become  a  member  of 
the  Senate.  He  was  not  very  rich  and,  though  a  man 
of  intelligence  and  vigour,  he  was  somewhat  lacking 
in  courage.  Consequently,  he  was  not  the  man  to 
dare  open  defiance  of  the  wrath,  or  a  frontal  attack 
on  the  interests,  of  the  dominant  caste;  rather  were 
these  violent  and  terrible  accusations  so  repugnant  to 
his  nature  that  he  had  never  brought  himself  hitherto 
to  assume  the  role  of  prosecutor  in  any  action.  He  had 
always  preferred  the  more  humane  part  of  defender. 
He  was,  however,  an  honourable  man,  with  small 
affection — like  all  the  equestrian  order — for  the  faction 
and  government  formed  by  Sulla;  and  he  was  fully 
conscious  of  the  obligation  imposed  on  him  by  the 
promise  which  he  had  made  so  solemnly  to  the  Sicilians. 
Besides,  he  was  young — only  thirty-.six  years  old — and 
was  still  a  man  of  secondary  importance.  A  case  of 
great  public  interest,  which  set  all  Italy  talking,  and 
in  which  he  was  the  popular  protagonist,  might  be  of 
great  service  to  his  lofty  and  legitimate  ambitions.  In 
addition,  things  had  been  moving  fast  recently,  to  the 
detriment  of  the  party  in  power,  who  were  accused  on 
all  sides  of  outrage  and  corruption.  The  consuls  for 
that   year   were   Pompcy   and    Crassus,    who,    though 


The  Trial  of  Verres  255 

members  of  the  Sullan  party,  had  come  forward  as 
candidates  with  a  Democratic  programme,  promising 
no  less  than  that  they  would  restore  to  the  tribunes  of 
the  plebs  those  powers  of  which  Sulla  had  stripped 
them.  There  was  a  feeling  in  the  air  which  seemed  to 
promise  that  just  for  once  the  infamies  of  a  governor 
might  receive  condign  punishment  from  outraged 
public  opinion. 

The  young  advocate  realised  that  the  decisive  moment 
of  his  life  had  come.  He  agreed  to  prosecute  Verres. 
But  what  crime  or  crimes  should  he  lay  to  his  charge? 
At  this  point  emerges  the  first  strange  feature  in  the 
history  of  this  strange  case.  The  budget  of  charges, 
recriminations,  and  denunciations  against  Verres, 
which  the  Sicilians  lodged  with  Cicero,  comprised 
enough  and  to  spare  of  crimes  of  every  sort,  some  of 
which  were  actually  of  a  capital  nature.  For  instance, 
Verres  was  accused  of  having  ordered  Roman  citizens 
to  execution — which  was  a  capital  offence.  But  what 
did  Cicero  do?  He  carefully  singled  out  the  least 
serious  charge  and  persuaded  the  Sicilians  to  lay  an 
indictment  de  pecuniis  rcpetiindis — to  demand,  that 
is  to  say,  that  Verres  should  be  condemned  to  pay  one 
hundred  million  prezzi  (twenty- five  million  francs) 
as  a  penalty  for  having  levied  unauthorised  taxes. 
How  are  we  to  explain  this  forbearance?  Cicero  in  his 
speeches  against  Verres  denounces  him  as  a  monster 
and  a  wild  beast.  He  launches  the  most  terrible 
invectives   against    his   villainies.     There   is    no   need, 


256  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

however,  to  interpret  too  literally  his  glowing  periods. 
Not  even  Cicero  could  forget,  while  he  was  accusing 
Verres,  that  he  himself  and  the  man  he  was  accus- 
ing belonged  to  the  same  class,  and  were  members 
of  the  samie  aristocracy,  which  controlled  the  vast 
Roman  Empire.  However  keen  might  be  the  indig- 
nation aroused  by  the  misdeeds  of  Verres,  not  even 
the  strictest  section  of  the  aristocracy  would  have 
approved  too  relentless  a  line  of  attack,  or  one  which 
involved  the  accused  in  too  serious  danger.  Personal 
hatred  was  a  less  powerful  factor  than  the  sentiment  of 
caste  and  the  interest  each  man  felt  in  securing  a  mitiga- 
tion of  the  severity  of  the  laws  in  favour  of  his  fellows, 
in  anticipation  of  a  similar  privilege  for  himself  when 
occasion  might  arise.  Therefore  Cicero  acted  wisely 
in  his  clients'  interests  when  he  chose  that  charge 
which  promised  the  least  danger  to  the  defendant; 
for  he  knew  that  otherwise  the  latter  would  have  an 
easier  task  in  escaping  conviction. 

The  weakness  of  the  attack,  however,  as  always 
happens,  emboldened  the  accused.  Verres  did  not 
hesitate  one  moment  to  make  a  political  matter  of  his 
case.  He  had  recourse  to  all  the  most  influential 
members  of  his  party.  He  begged  Q.  Hortensius,  who 
was  the  greatest  orator  and  the  cleverest  advocate  of 
the  day,  to  defend  him.  In  every  possible  way,  he 
tried  to  enlist  in  his  support  party  interests  and  caste 
consciousness.  He  represented  the  indictment  as  a 
machination  of  the  Democratic  party,  of  the  opposi- 


The  Trial  of  Verres  257 

tion,  to  bring  obloquy  on  the  party  which  had  been 
restored  to  power  by  Sulla.  He,  Verres,  was  the  victim, 
in  whose  person  it  was  hoped  to  strike  a  blow  at  the 
whole  of  the  Conservative  aristocracy,  and  at  Sulla's 
life  work!  This  view  of  the  matter  was  at  this  juncture 
not  unconvincing,  so  that  Verres,  when  he  began  the 
struggle,  found  himself  supported  by  powerful  friends. 
His  first  move  had  for  its  object  the  elimination  of 
Cicero  as  prosecutor.  The  Roman  law,  though  it 
allowed  anyone  to  constitute  himself  accuser  of  a 
citizen  who  had  violated  the  laws,  did  not  permit  an 
unlimited  number  of  people  to  get  up  and  accuse  a 
single  individual.  For,  in  that  case,  the  law  would 
have  worked  oppressively,  cruelly,  and  unconscionably. 
The  accusation  had  to  be  lodged  by  a  single  person; 
and  if  several  persons  asked  to  be  allowed  to  accuse  an 
individual,  it  was  the  duty  of  the  authority  to  choose 
one  of  them  as  the  accuser.  Verres  accordingly  tried 
to  find  a  rival  for  Cicero.  A  certain  Quintus  Cecilius 
Negro,  a  Roman  citizen,  but  of  Sicilian  origin  and  a 
Hebrew  by  religion,  who  had  been  Verres's  qusestor 
in  Sicily,  appeared  before  the  Praitor,  declaring  that 
he  wished  to  prosecute  Verres,  and  demanding  the 
privilege  over  Cicero  on  the  pretext  that  he  had  been 
insulted  by  Verres  in  Sicily.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there 
had  been  a  violent  quarrel  between  them  about  a 
certain  Agonis,  a  freedwoman  of  the  temple  of  Venus 
at  Eryx,  who  practised  the  profession  reserved  in  the 
ancient  world  for  the  slaves  of  the  temples  of  Venus. 
17 


258  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

So  a  preliminary  trial  was  necessary  to  decide  which 
should  be  the  accuser,  Cecilius  or  Cicero,  and  this 
trial  took  place  in  the  early  months  of  the  year  70. 
Cicero  made  a  powerful  speech  in  which  he  clearly 
insinuated  that  Cecilius  was  playing  a  part  with  the 
connivance  of  Verres;  that  the  former,  if  he  were 
chosen  to  be  the  accuser,  would  conduct  the  prosecu- 
tion in  the  way  best  calculated  to  secure  Verres's 
acquittal.  He  added  in  more  precise  terms  that  the 
case  was  of  the  greatest  political  importance,  inasmuch 
as  it  was  bound  to  prove  definitely  to  the  provinces 
whether  there  was  or  was  not  justice  to  be  had  in  Rome ; 
whether  the  subjects  of  Rome  might  expect  to  find 
their  rights  impartially  defended  in  the  courts  of  the 
Republic,  or  whether — as  the  enemies  of  Rome  and  the 
adversaries  of  the  dominant  party  were  repeating  on 
all  sides — the  aristocracy  were  nothing  but  a  corrupt 
and  rapacious  association  without  bowels  of  mercy 
for  the  victims  whom  they  tortured. 

Cicero  was  successful  in  this  first  skirmish.  He 
obtained  recognition  from  the  court  as  the  prosecutor 
of  Verres,  and  was  granted  one  hundred  and  ten  days 
in  which  to  proceed  to  Sicil}^  to  collect  the  proofs  of 
his  accusation.     He  started  at  once. 

At  Rome,  the  struggle  between  the  party  with  the 
purse  and  the  Democratic  opposition,  encouraged  by  the 
support  of  the  two  all-powerful  Consuls,  waxed  furious. 
Pompey  and  Crassus  induced  the  Senate  to  restore  to 
the  Tribunes  their  ancient  powers.     They  re-established 


The  Trial  of  Verres  259 

the  censorship  and  by  the  instrumentality  of  the  two 
newly  elected  Censors,  they  ejected  from  the  Senate 
many  of  the  more  contemptible  of  Sulla's  partisans. 
Marcus  Aurelius  Cotta  proposed  a  reform  of  the  courts 
which  would  have  removed  the  latter  almost  entirely 
from  the  influence  of  the  dominant  party. 

Naturally,  these  discussions,  these  laws,  and  these 
proposals  serv-ed  only  to  increase  the  general  excite- 
ment; and  of  this  excitement  Verres  took  advantage 
to  identify  still  further  his  own  cause  with  that  of  the 
party  in  power.  He  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the  party 
the  wealth  he  had  well  or  badly  earned  in  his  province 
as  well  as  his  influence  and  his  personality.  The  party 
on  their  side  chose  as  candidates  for  the  consulship 
Q.  Hortensius,  his  defending  counsel,  and  Ouintus 
Metellus,  who  was  a  great  friend  of  Verres;  for  the 
praetorship,  iVIarcus  Metellus,  a  brother  of  Quintus 
and  no  less  than  Quintus  a  friend  of  Verres.  They 
opposed  with  all  their  force  the  law  proposed  by  Cotta, 
which  would  have  transformed  the  courts  in  a  manner 
most  unfavourable  to  Verres's  interests.  The  Demo- 
cratic party  in  their  turn  took  the  wSicilians'  cause 
under  their  protection,  to  the  extent  of  choosing  Cicero, 
their  illustrious  advocate,  as  candidate  for  the  ^edile- 
ship. 

Thus  the  elections  of  the  3"ear  70  promised  to  be 
bound  up  in  the  trial  of  Verres.  They  seemed  likely 
to  be  the  means  by  which  the  two  parties  would 
endeavour  to  influence  public  opinion  in  favour  of  the 


26o  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

prosecution  or  of  the  defence.  Unfortunately,  when 
Cicero,  after  an  absence  of  about  two  months  returned 
to  Rome  from  Sicily,  with  abundant  matter  in  the 
shape  of  documents  and  proofs,  he  found  the  situation 
of  the  popular  party,  and  consequently  his  action 
against  Verres — for  its  fate  was  bound  up  in  that  of  the 
party — gravely  compromised  by  a  rupture  which  had 
arisen  between  the  two  Consuls.  There  was  no  love 
lost  between  Pompey  and  Crassus.  Each  was  jealous 
of  the  other.  In  putting  themselves  at  the  head  of  the 
Democratic  party,  they  had  been  guided  by  ambition 
and  political  calculations.  But  they  were  both  too  rich, 
and  had  too  many  ties  with,  and  friendships  among, 
the  dominant  party — from  which  both  of  them  came — 
to  be  able  to  infuse  much  zeal  and  sincerity  into  their 
services  to  the  opposition.  As  a  result,  each  had  ended 
by  attacking  the  other;  and  these  attacks,  after  some 
months  of  activity,  had  paralysed  the  Democratic 
party,  and  restored  boldness  and  confidence  to  the 
Conservative  party,  which  was  now  resolved  to  wreck 
the  law  of  judicial  reform  and  to  obtain  Verres's  acquit- 
tal, the  two  triumphs  at  which  it  aimed. 

When  Cicero  returned,  the  elections  were  imminent, 
and  because  of  their  imminence  everyone  was  in  a  state 
of  preoccupation  and  uncertainty.  It  would  not  have 
been  prudent  for  either  party  to  incur  the  risk  of  the 
trial  before  the  elections.  So  the  trial  was  postponed 
without  any  difficulty  or  opposition.  It  was  the  month 
of  June;  and,  in  the  following  July,  the  elections  would, 


The  Trial  of  Verres  261 

as  usual,  take  place.  Those  for  the  consulship  and 
praetorship  were  a  great  triumph  for  Verres.  Quintus 
Hortensius  and  Quintus  Aletellus  were  elected  Consuls; 
Marcus  Metellus  was  elected  Praetor.  Verres  had 
conquered  all  along  the  line!  The  evening  of  the  day 
on  which  the  Consuls  were  elected,  Verres  was  publicly 
congratulated  on  the  result  near  che  Arch  of  Fabius 
by  several  members  of  the  aristocracy;  and  one  of  them, 
Caius  Curion,  told  him  in  so  many  words  that  "the 
comitia  had  acquitted  him."  Cicero  was  naturally 
much  upset;  but  he  did  not  lose  heart.  He  discon- 
tinued for  some  time  working  up  his  case,  and  devoted 
himself  entirely  to  his  election  to  the  ajdileship.  The 
Demiocratic  party  had  realised  that,  after  their  want 
of  success  in  the  elections  to  the  consulship  and  the 
pra^torship,  a  further  failure  in  the  shape  of  Cicero's 
non-election  would  seriously  compromise  their  chances 
in  the  prosecution  of  Verres.  In  fact,  Verres  and  his 
friends  were  working  like  demons  against  Cicero,  using 
against  him  all  the  resources  of  money,  intrigue,  and 
calumny.  Those  vv'cre  days  of  anxiety  and  turmoil 
for  Cicero,  the  days  of  the  struggle,  but,  thanks  to  the 
energetic  support  on  this  occasion  of  Pompey,  Cicero 
was  elected. 

The  elections  over,  attention  was  again  directed  to 
the  trial,  the  opening  of  which  was  fixed  for  the  5th  of 
Au^^nist;  and  the  two  parties  began  to  sharpen  their 
weapons  for  the  decisive  and  supreme  issue.  There 
were  two  phases  to  a  Roman  trial ;  in  the  initial  phase, 


262  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  prosecutor  had  the  first  word,  opening  his  case,  and 
the  defendant  replied;  the  witnesses  also  were  heard. 
Then  followed  a  suspension  of  the  proceedings,  after 
which  the  prosecutor  once  more  spoke  and  the  defend- 
ant once  more  replied.  Then  the  jury — for  the  Court 
was  composed  of  a  jury  drawn  by  lot  from  the  body 
of  Senators  and  presided  over  by  the  Praetor — gave  its 
verdict.  Those  in  favour  of  acquittal  wrote  an  A 
{ahsolvo)  on  the  waxed  tablet,  those  in  favour  of  convic- 
tion wrote  a  C  {condemno).  Cicero's  intention  was  to 
abbreviate  his  opening  statement  as  much  as  possible; 
then  to  bring  forward  a  large  number  of  witnesses  whom 
he  had  brought  from  Sicily  and  collected  in  Rome,  so 
as  to  make  a  complete  history  of  the  whole  of  Verres's 
political  life  and  administration.  The  charge  against 
Verres  was  that  he  had  extorted  forty  million  sestertii 
from  the  provincials.  But  it  would  not  satisfy  Cicero 
to  prove  only  this  point.  He  wanted  to  show  that 
Verres  had  been  guilty  of  the  countless  rascalities 
which  the  popular  voice  attributed  to  him,  beginning 
from  the  time  of  his  first  occupation  of  the  office  of 
quaestor;  in  short,  to  reconstruct  with  the  help  of  wit- 
nesses and  documentary  evidence  the  whole  of  his 
public  and  private  life.  To  strengthen  the  impression 
made  by  his  case,  he  intended  to  bring  the  witnesses 
forward  in  groups  corresponding  to  the  different 
charges,  and  to  introduce  one  group  after  the  other, 
prefacing  the  introduction  of  each  group  with  a  short 
explanatory   speech,   in   such   a  way  as  to  focus   the 


The  Trial  of  Verres  263 

attention  of  the  public  each  time  on  a  definite  and 
precise  episode  in  Verrcs's  career. 

This  method  of  procedure  on  the  part  of  the  prosecu- 
tion may  seem  to  us  barbarous  and  inhuman.  We 
should  think  it  atrocious  if,  even  against  the  greatest 
of  scoundrels,  the  prosecution  instituted  an  inquiry 
into  the  whole  of  his  life  in  order  to  punish  him  for, 
and  to  convict  him  of,  a  single  offence.  Against  such 
methods,  we  should  not  expect  anyone,  however  inno- 
cent, to  be  able  to  defend  himself.  And  yet,  so  greatly 
do  feelings  and  ideas  change  in  the  world — Verres  and 
most  of  his  friends  had  hopes  of  finding  their  best  line 
of  defence  in  this  relentless  prosecution.  An  all- 
embracing  accusation,  such  as  Cicero  intended  to  make, 
might,  it  is  true,  annihilate  a  man;  but  it  required  much 
time,  days  and  days  of  discussion.  Now,  time  was  the 
ally  on  which  Verres  and  his  friends  counted  most 
confidently.  The  trial  began  on  the  5th  of  August; 
the  1 6th  to  the  31st  of  August  were  the  dates  fixed 
for  the  celebration  of  the  games  which  Pomipey  had 
promised  for  years  pavSt  in  memory  of  his  victories  over 
Sertorius.  During  this  interval,  the  trial  would  have 
to  be  suspended.  Further  suspensions  would  be 
necessary  from  the  4th  to  the  19th  of  September, 
because  of  the  Roman  games;  from  the  26th  ot  October 
to  the  4th  of  November  because  of  the  games  of  Victory ; 
from  the  4th  to  the  17th  of  November  because  of  the 
ludi  plchei.  Thanks  to  this  abundance  of  games,  then, 
there  was  a  prospect,  especially  when  Cicero's  wish  to 


264  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

amplify  the  indictment  was  taken  into  account,  that 
the  discussion  would  be  unduly  prolonged.  Other 
pretexts  for  postponement  would  surely  not  be  want- 
ing. In  the  meantime  public  interest  would  flag; 
and,  if  one  could  look  forward  to  the  new  year, 
the  presidency  of  the  jury  would  pass  to  the  new 
Praetor,  Marcus  Metellus,  who  was  an  intimate  friend 
of  Verres.  With  his  connivance,  it  would  be  easy  to 
find  a  way  of  bringing  the  prosecution  to  an  end  with 
a  convenient  acquittal.  In  fact,  Hortensius  advised 
Verres  to  let  Cicero  call  as  many  witnesses  as  he  wished, 
and  to  let  them  talk  freely,  without  contradicting  them 
and  without  being  drawn  into  a  discussion  with  them, 
but  listening  to  them  in  austere  and  contemptuous 
silence. 

The  doubtful  and  decisive  point,  then,  of  this  great 
struggle  was  this :  whether  greater  success  would  attend 
Cicero  in  his  efforts  to  move  the  public  with  his  tena- 
cious and  insistent  accusations,  or  Verres  and  his  friends 
in  their  efforts  to  tire  out  that  public  with  their  passive 
resistance.  At  last,  on  August  5th,  the  trial,  the 
preparations  for  which  had  occupied  so  many  months, 
began.  The  public  expectations  and  curiosity  were 
immense.  The  struggles  and  intrigues  of  the  parties 
had  by  now  converted  the  trial  into  a  political  event. 
The  Democratic  opposition  wanted  Verres  to  be  con- 
victed, so  as  to  inflict  a  humiliation  on  the  dominant 
party  and  to  be  able  to  accuse  it  of  countenancing  the 
pillage    of    the    provinces.     The    Conservative    party 


The  Trial  of  Vcrrcs  265 

wished  for  Verres's  acquittal  so  as  to  be  able  to  assert 
that  these  accusations  of  misgovernmcnt,  like  so  many 
others  that  had  been  launched  on  previous  occasions 
against  other  governors,  were  calumnies  concocted  by 
the  Democratic  part}',  and  noxious  calumnies  to  boot, 
inasmuch  as  they  jeopardised  the  prestige  of  the  Empire 
amongst  its  subjects.  Rome  was,  during  these  weeks, 
full  of  Italians  from  the  North  and  South,  who  had  come 
for  the  elections,  the  games,  and  the  new  census;  hence 
the  trial  gained  in  general  interest  and  importance. 
During  the  days  of  waiting  for  the  Pompeian  games  to 
begin,  this  great  trial,  in  which  Hortensius  and  Cicero, 
the  Conservative  aristocracy  and  the  Popular  party, 
were  to  be  pitted  against  each  other,  promised  to 
be  an  interesting  way  of  passing  the  time  for  all  those 
strangers  who  had  nothing  to  do.  In  ancient  Rome, 
as  in  all  parts  of  the  world  nowadays,  trials  were  a 
gratuitous  spectacle  much  to  the  taste  of  the  public. 
Thus,  on  that  morning  of  the  5th  of  August,  an  immense 
crowd  thronged  the  Forum,  round  the  benches  on  which 
the  judges,  the  prosecution,  the  defendant,  and  his 
supporters  were  to  take  their  seats. 

Verres  showed  a  proud  and  resolute  bearing,  and 
appeared  surrounded  by  a  crowd  of  influential  friends. 
Cicero  had  the  first  word,  and  made  a  short  speech, 
in  which  he  did  not  refer  to  any  of  the  facts  to  which 
his  witnesses  were  expected  to  testify,  saying  that  he 
would  let  them  speak  for  themselves.  He  preferred 
to  deal  generically  with  the  political  and  moral  import- 


266  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

ance  of  the  trial.  He  said  that  the  provinces,  nay, 
the  whole  Empire  was  anxiously  following  the  pro- 
ceeding which  would  tell  whether  there  were  judges 
and  any  hope  of  justice  in  Rome.  He  concluded  with 
a  dexterous  reference  to  the  suspicions  of  corruption 
which  were  flying  about,  and  to  the  boasts  that  Verres 
was  supposed  to  have  made  of  his  ability,  with  the  help 
of  his  money,  to  flout  with  impunity  every  court  of 
justice.  It  was  for  Hortensius  to  reply  to  Cicero's 
speech;  but  he  complained  that  it  had  been  so  vague 
and  generic  that  it  contained  no  single  point  which  he 
could  seize  and  demolish. 

Then  began  a  long  procession  of  witnesses,  and  a 
fierce  and  venomous  lot  they  were,  with  terrible  tales 
for  the  ears  of  the  judges  and  the  public!  In  order  to 
secure  Verres's  conviction  and  sentence  to  a  fine  of  one 
hundred  million  sestertii,  under  the  lex  de  pecuniis 
repetundis,  Cicero  produced  witnesses  who  accused 
him  of  every  sort  of  crime;  of  having  committed  acts 
of  sacrilege,  of  having  gone  shares  with  the  pirates 
whom  he  ought  to  have  harried  and  destroyed,  of 
having  been  guilty  of  numberless  acts  of  peculation 
and  malversation,  and  of  having  condemned  Roman 
citizens  to  death !  To  prove  these  charges,  Cicero  had 
unearthed  hundreds  of  witnesses  from  every  class  of 
society,  of  both  sexes,  and  of  all  ages,  who,  carefully 
coached  and  prepared  beforehand,  entered  the  witness- 
box  to  add  their  quota  to  the  fierce  attacks  on  Verres. 
It  is  difficult  to  judge  how  much  of  these  impassioned 


The  Trial  of  Verres  267 

and  violent  stories  was  true,  and  how  much  pure 
invention,  as  we  have  no  documentary  evidence  relating 
to  this  trial  other  than  the  speeches  for  the  prosecution. 
Besides,  Verres,  as  we  have  said,  did  not  avail  himself 
of  the  right  of  cross-examination  which  the  law  allowed 
him.  He  allowed  the  avalanche  of  charges  to  slide 
unchecked  dov,m  the  slope,  and  to  hurl  itself  into  the 
valley,  hoping  that  it  would  stop  of  its  own  accord. 
However,  it  is  not  improbable  that  the  evidence  con- 
tained no  small  number  of  exaggerations.  A  Sicilian 
friend  of  mine,  an  eminent  politician  and  a  man  with  a 
profound  knowledge  of  his  native  island,  is  constantly 
reminding  me  that,  even  at  the  present  day,  the  Sicilians 
throw  so  much  passion  into  their  political  struggles 
that  great  circumspection  is  required  in  sifting  the 
accusations  hurled  by  one  side  against  the  other,  when 
rivalry  and  party  animosity  come  into  play.  "Only 
imagine,"  he  says,  "how  it  must  have  been  in  ancient 
times."  Besides,  everyone  who  reads  Cicero's  speeches 
cannot  help  feeling,  from  time  to  time,  that  the  list  of 
villainies  he  enumerates  is  really  too  long  even  for  the 
greatest  villain  that  ever  lived. 

Although  we  to-day  can  pass  a  dispassionate  judg- 
ment on  the  events  of  twenty  centuries  ago,  their 
contemporaries,  embroiled  in  the  turmoil  of  unbridled 
passions,  were  not  capable  of  so  great  detachment. 
At  this  point,  a  phenomenon  occurred  which  neither 
Cicero,  Hortensius,  nor  Verres  had  foreseen.  Public 
opinion,  which  had  been  grumbling  for  a  long  time  at 


268  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  excesses  of  the  oligarchical  government,  and  which 
was  ready  to  extend  blind  credence  to  such  charges  as 
the  subtle  propaganda  of  the  democratic  opposition 
devised,  gave  birth  to  one  of  those  formidable  and 
unexpected  movements  which  no  human  force  can 
resist.  Day  by  day,  as  the  evidence  of  the  witnesses 
spread  from  the  Forum  through  the  city,  was  digested, 
embroidered,  exaggerated  from  mouth  to  mouth, — in 
those  days,  conversation  performed  the  function  of 
newspapers,  with  the  same  defects,  imprecision,  and 
exaggeration,  as  the  latter, — an  ungovernable  wave  of 
indignation  against  Verres  swept  over  Rome.  No  one 
set  himself  to  sift  the  evidence  dispassionately,  or  by 
subtle  analysis  to  separate  the  true  from  the  legendary. 
The  weightier  and  the  more  terrible  the  charges  against 
Verres,  the  more  readily  they  found  credence.  Each 
succeeding  day  saw  an  increase  in  the  public  indignation 
and  fury,  as  well  as  in  the  crowd  that  filled  the  Forum. 
On  the  day  on  which  a  witness  deposed  that  Verres  had 
condemned  to  death  a  Ronian  citizen  who  had  in  vain 
cried,  "Cms  Romanus  sum,'"  such  a  hubbub  and  com- 
motion arose  among  the  public  that  the  Praetor  was 
obliged  to  close  the  sitting  in  hot  haste,  for  fear  of 
some  great  calamity  if  the  case  proceeded.  For  five, 
six,  seven,  even  for  ten  days,  Verres  and  his  defenders 
faced  the  storm,  hoping  that  the  wind  would  shift, 
that,  after  the  first  burst  of  passion  was  spent,  public 
opinion  would  veer  round,  regain  self-control,  and  re- 
enter a  state  of  calm,  conducive  to  reasoning  and  dis- 


The  Trial  of  Vcrres  269 

cussion.  Each  morning  saw  the  inexorable  figure  of 
Cicero  at  the  head  of  a  new  handful  of  witnesses,  who 
came  to  re-kindle  the  pubHc  indignation  by  revelations 
of  new  crimes  and  villainies,  real  or  imaginary. 

When,  after  fourteen  days  of  discussion,  the  first 
phase  of  the  case  came  to  an  end  and  there  was  a  sus- 
pension of  jjroceedings  pending  the  second  phase, 
Verres,  his  defenders,  and  his  friends,  were  obliged  to 
hold  a  council  of  war.  The  situation  was  desperate. 
The  hope  of  tiring  out  public  opinion  with  the  length  of 
the  proceedings  had  proved  a  vain  illusion.  There  was 
no  longer  room  for  hope  that  the  court  might  acquit 
Verres.  Even  if  every  one  of  the  judges  had  been  con- 
vinced of  the  entire  and  complete  innocence  of  Verres, 
they  would  not  have  dared  to  acquit  him  in  face  of 
the  excited  state  of  public  opinion,  for  fear  of  being 
suspected  of  corruption.  Rome,  Italy,  the  Empire, 
would  have  declared  with  one  voice  that  the  judges 
had  absolved  Verres  because  they  had  been  bought 
with  the  gold  which  he  had  extorted  in  such  quantities 
from  the  Sicilians.  The  public  clamoured  for  their 
victim.  Besides,  even  supposing  that  the  judges 
had  the  inconceivable  courage  to  acquit  Verres,  his 
political  career,  after  such  a  scandal,  was  at  an  end. 
What  use  was  it  then  to  persist  with  the  struggle, 
when  the  battle  was  already  irretrievably  lost?  It  was 
best  to  give  in.  Verres  had  better  not  show  himself 
further  at  the  trial,  and  had  better  go  into  voluntary 
exile.     In  that  case,  he  was  sure  to  be  fined  much  less 


270  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

heavily,  and  to  save  his  patrimony  from  the  wreck 
of  his  political  fortunes. 

Verres  bowed  his  head  to  destiny,  which  had  chosen 
him  to  be,  in  the  eyes  of  Italy  and  the  Empire,  the 
victim  sacrificed  to  expiate  the  misdeeds  and  the  out- 
rages committed  by  all  the  Roman  governors  since  the 
restoration  of  Sulla.  When  the  trial  began  again, 
for  the  second  and  decisive  phase,  he  did  not  put  in  an 
appearance.  He  had  already  gone  into  exile.  Such 
was  the  delight  of  the  judges  that,  by  declaring  him- 
self guilty,  he  had  spared  them  the  unpleasant  and 
responsible  task  of  doing  so  themselves,  that  they 
inflicted  upon  him  the  lightest  of  punishments.  They 
condemned  him  to  pay,  not  one  hundred  millions,  as 
the  Sicilians  demanded,  but  only  three  millions  of 
sestertii.  A  fine  of  three  million  sestertii  was  the  judicial 
imprimatur  on  a  trial,  in  the  course  of  which  a  member 
of  the  Roman  aristocracy  had  been  accused  by  a  host 
of  witnesses  of  the  greatest  atrocities  and  outrages, 
some  of  which,  if  true,  would  have  sufficed  to  bring 
him  to  the  scaffold. 

When  we  read  the  violent  speeches  which  Cicero 
wrote  after  the  trial,  and  which  he  would  have  pro- 
nounced, if  it  had  continued  into  its  second  phase, 
in  order  to  sum  up  and  point  the  moral  of  the  terrible 
evidence  which  had  been  given  against  Verres;  when  we 
compare  these  speeches  and  the  charges  which  they 
formulate,  annotate,  and  tabulate  with  the  lenient  and 
light  penalty  inflicted,  we  can,  at  first  blush,  only  feel 


The  Trial  of  Verres  271 

surprise.  The  historian  asks  himself  whether  the 
whole  of  this  trial — which  is  certainly  one  of  the  most 
famous  in  the  history  of  the  world — was  not  a  sort  of 
comedy  played  by  actors  of  great  skill  for  the  benefit 
of  an  ignorant  and  ingenuous  pubHc.  Such  a  judgment 
would,  however,  be  too  severe.  Cicero  was  an  honour- 
able and  upright  man,  and  defended  the  cause  of  his 
Sicilian  clients  with  sincerity  and  loyalty.  No,  this 
trial  was  not  simply  a  judicial  episode.  It  was  a 
political  drama,  and,  like  all  political  dramas,  was  over- 
laid with  phenomena  which  to  a  certain  extent  hide 
its  real  nature  and  essence  fromi  the  eyes  of  posterity 
as  it  hid  these  from  those  of  its  contemporaries.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten  that  all  the  actors  in  this  trial, 
the  accused,  the  prosecutor,  the  defending  counsel,  and 
the  judges,  belonged  to  the  same  aristocracy.  At  a 
certain  moment  this  aristocracy  had  found  itself 
compelled,  by  intestinal  quarrels  and  by  a  complex 
political  situation,  to  sacrifice,  in  a  trial  at  law,  one  of 
its  members  in  order  to  satisfy  public  opinion,  Italy, 
and  the  Empire;  in  order  to  prove  that  it  was  not  true, 
as  a  whole  party  was  busy  whispering  about  Rome, 
that  the  Roman  governors,  provided  they  belonged  to 
the  Conservative  aristocracy,  were  allowed  to  do  what 
they  liked  in  the  provinces  and  that  their  subjects  were 
abandoned  defenceless  to  their  caprices  and  their 
greed.  But  the  particular  member  of  the  aristocracy 
whom  it  was  found  necessary  to  sacrifice,  whether  he 
were  or  were  not   so  great  a  villain  as  his  enemies 


272   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

asserted,  had  friends,  protectors,  and  supporters  who 
exerted  an  influence  sufflciently  great  amongst  the 
dominant  party  to  admit  of  too  ruthless  an  attack 
being  made  upon  him. 

Cicero  himself  Vv^ho  apparently  attacks  Verres  with 
such  fury,  in  reality  endeavours  to  do  him  as  little 
harm  as  possible.  At  every  stage  of  his  comments  on 
the  serious  evidence  of  the  witnesses,  he  says  that,  if 
Verres  is  not  convicted  under  the  lex  de  pecuniis 
repetundis,  he  will  accuse  him  of  a  greater  crime,  as 
though  to  persuade  him  that  the  prosecution  has  had 
the  utmost  possible  regard  for  him.  In  short,  the 
trial  and  the  condemnation  of  Verres  were  a  twofold 
satisfaction  which  the  Roman  aristocracy  was  forced 
to  offer  to  the  public  opinion  of  Italy  and  to  the 
provinces;  but,  while  offering  it,  she  tried,  in  every 
possible  way,  to  temper  the  blow  to  the  predestined 
victim.  In  fact,  Verres,  though  forced  to  renounce 
every  political  ambition,  was  able  to  live  the  life  of  a 
grand  seigneur  quietly  in  Italy.  And  that  is  actually 
what  he  did,  devoting  himself  especially  to  the  collection 
of  those  works  of  art  for  which  he  had  such  a  passion. 
After  the  trial,  there  is  no  mention  of  him  in  Roman 
history.  He  disappears;  and,  after  the  year  70,  his 
name  does  not  reappear  till  more  than  twenty-seven 
years  later  as  one  of  the  victims  of  the  famous  pro- 
scriptions organised  in  43  and  42  by  Antonius,  Lepidus, 
and  Octavianus:  the  same  proscriptions  in  which 
Cicero,    his   accuser,    perished.     Inasmuch   as   Verres 


The  Trial  of  Verres  273 

had  been  for  the  elapsed  twenty-seven  years  but  an 
obscure  spectator  of  the  political  struggles  of  Rome, 
it  is  clear  that  he  must  have  been  included  in  the  lists 
of  the  proscribed  because  his  riches  excited  the  cupidity 
of  the  Triumvirs. 

The  famous  trial,  while  it  cut  short  Verres's  political 
career,  brought  Cicero's  to  the  heights  of  success.  The 
trial  of  Verres  made  of  Cicero,  who  up  to  that  time 
had  been  a  promising  young  man,  one  of  the  foremost 
political  figures  in  Rome.  The  Conservative  aristo- 
cracy recognised  in  him  an  orator  whose  eloquence 
might  be  terrible.  The  Democratic  party  was  grateful 
to  him  for  the  humiliation  which  he  had  inflicted  on 
the  dominant  party.  Italy  and  the  provinces  welcomed 
in  him  the  honourable  Senator,  the  disinterested  advo- 
cate, the  intrepid  defender  of  dov/n-trodden  justice, 
the  man  who  had  publicly  affirmed,  at  no  small  risk 
to  himself,  that  Rome  owed  it  to  her  own  honour  to 
govern  with  equity  and  uprightness  the  immense 
empire  of  which  fortune  had  made  her  mistress. 
Assuredly,  Cicero  deserved  such  admiration,  even 
though  his  attack  on  Yerres  had  not  been  so  bitter 
as  the  public  supposed. 

The  trial  of  Verres  is  the  first  great  page  in  Cicero's 
history.  Who  could,  however,  have  prophesied  to 
him,  in  70,  that  history  would  write  the  name  of  Verres 
beside  his  own  yet  once  again,  but  on  the  last  page, 
that  of  a  tragic  and  glorious  death?  How  life  teems 
with  strange  coincidences!  These  two  men  who  con- 
18 


274   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

fronted  each  other  in  one  of  the  most  famous  legal 
duels  in  history,  who  separated  with  faces  turned 
towards  such  diverse  destinies — the  conqueror  to  find 
glory  and  power,  the  conquered  to  find  obscurity  and 
seclusion — were  fated  to  meet  once  more  in  life,  at  the 
last  hour,  on  the  brink  of  the  same  abyss. 


II 

THE  TRIAL  OF  CLODIUS 

TN  December  of  the  year  62  B.C.,  the  festival  of  the 
•'•  Bona  Dea  was  being  celebrated  as  usual  in  Rome. 
This  goddess  was  one  of  Rome's  strangest  deities.  She 
represented  fertility;  and  the  object  of  the  December 
ceremonies  was  to  move  the  goddess  to  grant  that  all 
the  fountains  of  fertility  which  nourish  the  life  and 
prosperity  of  a  nation  might  flow  coj^iously  throughout 
the  year.  Women  only  were  admitted  to  the  festivi- 
ties, which  were  due  to  take  place  at  night  in  the  house 
of  the  Consul  or  of  the  Praetor.  The  wife  of  the  Praetor 
or  of  the  Consul  presided;  the  lady  members  of  the 
aristocracy  took  part ;  but  the  master  of  the  house,  with 
all  the  male  slaves,  was  required  to  absent  himself. 
It  was  popularly  believed  that  the  man  who  dared  to 
take  part  in  the  mysteries  of  the  Bo7ia  Dea  would  be 
immediately  struck  blind. 

In  that  particular  year,  the  ceremonies  took  place  in 
the  house  of  Julius  Cassar,  who  was  Pnetor  at  the  time, 
under  the  presidency  of  his  wife,  Pompeia,  and  his 
mother,  Aurelia.     Caesar  had  left  the  house,  which  had 

275 


276   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

been  decorated  as  the  rites  required.  All  the  ladies 
of  the  aristocracy  had  assembled  there,  and  the  mys- 
terious ceremonies  were  being  carried  on  through  the 
night,  as  usual,  when  in  one  of  the  rooms  a  slave 
belonging  to  Caesar's  mother  encountered  a  musician 
who  seemed  to  have  lost  her  way  in  the  huge  house,  and 
not  to  know  what  she  ought  to  do  or  where  to  go.  The 
slave  asked  the  stranger  whom  or  what  she  was  looking 
for.  The  musician  did  not  answer.  The  slave,  her 
suspicions  aroused  by  the  other's  silence,  persisted 
with  her  questions.  The  musician  was  driven  at  last 
to  say  that  she  was  looking  for  one  of  Pompeia's  slaves, 
by  name  Abra.  But  Aurelia's  slave  was  horror-struck 
when  she  heard  the  musician's  voice.  It  was  the  voice 
of  a  man!  At  once,  with  loud  screams,  she  gave  the 
alarm.  A  man,  a  man  disguised  as  a  woman,  was 
present  at  the  sacred  rites  of  the  Bona  Deal  The 
musician  bolted.  Caesar's  mother,  a  dignified  and 
energetic  woman,  suspended  the  ceremonies,  immedi- 
ately ordered  all  the  doors  to  be  shut,  and,  followed  by 
all  the  matrons,  searched  the  house  thoroughly  from 
top  to  bottom.  At  last  the  musician  was  found  hidden 
in  Abra's  room;  and  several  of  the  ladies  present 
believed  they  recognised  in  her  a  young  Roman  patri- 
cian, famous  in  Rome  for  the  blueness  of  his  blood, 
and  for  his  extravagance:  Publius  Clodius.  He  was 
expelled  from  the  house,  and  the  meeting  broke  up. 
Next  day,  all  Rome  knew  that  Publius  Clodius  had 
dared  to  try  to  profane  the  mysteries  of  the  Botia  Dea; 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  2']'] 

and  the  news  created  an  immense  sensation.  Publius 
Clodius  was  the  youthful  descendant  of  one  of  Rome's 
most  ancient,  illustrious,  and  famous  patrician  houses. 
His  father,  his  grandfather,  his  great-grandfather,  and 
his  great-great-grandfather  had  all  been  Consuls. 
Thus  he  belonged  to  one  of  those  families  which  imper- 
sonated in  the  eyes  of  Italy  the  glory,  the  power,  and  the 
virtue  of  Rome.  That  the  youthful  scion  of  one  of 
these  venerated  families  should  have  dared  to  commit 
such  a  sacrilege  was  a  thing  which  would  have  made 
a  painful  impression  in  Rome  at  any  time.  But  the 
moment  was  a  critical  and  uncertain  one.  The  impres- 
sion made  by  the  conspiracy  of  Catiline  was  still  lively 
and  fresh.  Everywhere,  especially  in  the  more  re- 
spectable section  of  society,  a  feeling  of  disgust  mingled 
with  fear  prevailed.  The  public  was  in  favour  of 
severe  measures.  All  seriously  minded  people  gave  it 
as  their  opinion  that  the  prevailing  licence  of  manners, 
and  especially  the  effrontery  of  the  young  men,  must 
be  curbed,  if  the  Empire  was  not  to  crumble  into  decay. 
If  matters  had  come  to  such  a  pass  that  a  Claudius,  a 
man  whose  name  had  for  so  many  centuries  spelt  to  the 
Romans  all  the  austere  and  traditional  virtues  of  the 
Roman  citizenship  of  old,  dared  profane  the  most 
sacred  rites  of  religion,  what  might  not  be  feared  at 
the  hands  of  a  creedless,  dissolute,  corrupt  youth, 
which  was  preparing  to  invade,  with  the  new  generation, 
the  ofificial  posts  of  the  Republic? 

Great,  therefore,  was  the  public  indignation;  and  the 


2']^  Ancient  Rome  and  IModern  America 

strict  party,  captained  by  Cato,  a  small  party  but 
active  and  powerful  in  the  Senate,  perceived  that  now 
was  the  moment  to  make  an  example.  That  Clodius 
had,  up  to  that  time,  served  the  Conservative  party, 
the  aristocratic  community  which  Sulla  had  restored 
to  power;  that  in  the  conspiracy  of  Catiline  he  had 
zealously  helped  Cicero  and  defended  the  cause  of 
the  order,  counted  for  little,  nay,  rather  was  it  all  to  the 
good.  It  was  necessary  to  show  the  people  that  the 
aristocracy  could  still,  as  in  the  good  old  times,  bring 
themselves  to  strike  at  their  own  members,  when  they 
failed  in  their  most  sacred  duties. 

The  tales  which  soon  spread  among  the  public  as  to 
the  reasons  for  the  sacrilege  only  served  to  fan  the 
flame  of  indignation.  It  was  whispered  that  Clodius 
was  the  paramour  of  Pompeia,  Caesar's  wife;  and  that 
he  had  endeavoured,  with  the  connivance  of  Abra, 
Pompeia's  slave,  to  gain  an  entrance  into  the  festivities, 
for  the  purpose  of  an  assignation  with  her!  The  sacri- 
lege, therefore,  was  twofold.  The  rites  of  the  Bona 
Dea  were  intended  to  assure  the  prosperity  of  the 
people.  It  was  infamous  that  a  young  aristocrat  should 
have  dared  to  take  advantage  of  them  to  further  an 
intrigue  of  gallantry.  An  example  must  be  made; 
this  was  for  several  days  the  general  chorus  throughout 
Rome.  The  most  sacred  things  of  the  Republic  could 
not  be  left  a  prey  to  this  corrupt  and  depraved  youth. 
The  cynicism  of  a  few  dissolutes  must  not  be  allowed  to 
expose  the  Republic  to  the  wrath  of  the  gods ! 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  279 

An  example  must  be  made — certainly!  But  how? 
The  law  contained  no  provision  applying  to  such  an  act 
as  Clodius  had  committed.  Anyone  desirous  of  pro- 
secuting him  would  not  have  known  what  law  to  invoke 
in  order  to  hale  him  before  the  judges.  The  case  was 
unprecedented ;  and  it  had  never  occurred  to  anyone  to 
write  it  down  a  crime,  with  a  definite  legal  imprimatur 
attached.  The  ancient  code  was  extremely  formal,  es- 
pecially in  questions  of  rites  and  religion,  and  soClodius's 
deed  remained  a  wicked,  impious,  and  shameful  one, 
which  was  calculated  to  cover  him  with  infamy,  but 
which  could  not  be  punished  by  the  law.  Sensible, 
cautious,  and  prudent  people,  in  the  Senate,  and  out  of 
it,  lost  no  time  in  convincing  themselves  on  this  point; 
while  Clodius,  his  friends,  and  his  family,  which  was  a 
most  influential  one,  began  to  intercede,  to  pray,  and  to 
intrigue.  It  was  true  that  Clodius  had  committed  an 
act  of  unpardonable  levity,  which  would  ruin  his  politi- 
cal career  for  all  time.  But  it  was  an  act  for  which 
there  was  no  punishment,  save  the  reprobation  of  all 
good  citizens. 

So  colourless  a  solution  was,  however,  not  at  all  to 
the  taste  of  the  public,  which  was  deeply  moved  by  the 
sacrilege,  and  roused  to  fury  against  these  great  families 
who  abused  their  power  in  so  scandalous  a  way.  The 
public  demanded  a  severer  punishment.  The  small 
Pietist  party,  feeling  itself  backed  by  public  opinion, 
brought  the  matter  before  the  Senate,  by  the  mouth 
of   an    obscure    Senator    named    Quintus    Cornificius. 


2So   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Cornificius  proposed  that  the  College  of  PontitTs  be 
consulted,  and  their  opinion  asked  as  to  the  gravity  and 
character  of  the  crime  committed  by  Clodius.  The 
proposal  was  an  ingenious  one.  According  to  ancient 
ideas,  it  was  incumbent  on  the  State  itself  to  take 
precautions  that  the  gods  should  have  no  motive  for 
losing  their  tempers  with  the  people  and  the  city, 
and  thereupon  wreaking  vengeance  upon  Rome.  With 
the  public  thrown  into  such  a  state  of  fear  and  com- 
motion by  Clodius's  sacrilege,  the  Senate  could  not 
refuse  to  consult  the  Pontiffs,  to  learn  from  them 
whether  this  act  constituted  an  outrage  against  the 
gods,  and,  if  so,  an  outrage  of  what  gravity.  The 
College  of  PondtTs  answered  that  the  act  was  iicfas — the 
technical  expression  which  indicated  the  gravest  of 
delinquencies  towards  the  divinity.  Their  answer 
could  not  have  been  otherwise.  Nevertheless,  how- 
ever 7iefas  the  act  might  be,  tJierc  was  no  law  which 
punished  it. 

So  when  the  answer  of  the  College  of  Pontiffs  reached 
the  Senators,  the  latter  foimd  themselves  confronted 
with  the  following  situation.  A  \'ery  grave  and 
scandalous  crime  had  been  committed  by  one  of  the 
best-known  members  of  the  aristocracy.  This  crime 
had  stirred  the  public  indignation  to  its  depths,  and  had 
been  declared  Jiefas  by  the  College  of  Pontiffs.  Yet 
there  was  no  way  of  punish.ing  it,  because  the  arsenal 
of  the  law  did  not  provide  the  weapons  necessary  for 
its  punishment.     The  danger  inherent  in  this  state  of 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  281 

affairs  was  obvious.  The  public,  infuriated  and  dis- 
mayed, would  never  believe  that  Clodius  could  not  be 
punished — because  the  laws  had  never  even  imagined 
that  such  an  abomination  could  ever  be  commiitted  by  a 
Roman.  The  pubhc  v/ould  declare  that  Clodius  had 
escaped  his  richly-deserved  punishment  because  he 
belonged  to  one  of  the  most  conspicuous  and  influential 
families  in  Rome.  The  aristocracy  was  superior  to  the 
law;  it  could  even  provoke  with  impunity  the  wrath  of 
the  gods  against  the  city!  What  was  to  be  done? 
Public  opinion,  in  its  agitated  state,  kept  egging  on  the 
vSenate;  and  the  Pietist  and  ruthless  party,  profiting  by 
the  popular  agitation,  attempted  a  daring  move,  pro- 
posing to  the  Senate  that  it  should  invite  the  Consuls  to 
make  a  special  law,  which  should  have  retrospective 
force,  and  should  declare  Clodius's  act  on  a  plane  with 
the  crime  of  incest, — make  it  equivalent,  that  is,  to  the 
seduction  of  a  vestal  virgin,  a  crime  which,  according 
to  ancient  law,  was  punishable  with  death,  and  which 
fell  to  be  judged  by  the  College  of  Pontiffs.  Never- 
theless, no  one,  not  even  Cato,  could  delude  himself 
into  thinking  that  the  College  of  Pontiffs  would  con- 
demn Clodius  to  death.  Consec|ucntly,  the  law  pro- 
posed to  constitute  a  special  tribunal, — which  would 
not  l)e  that  of  the  Pontiffs,  nor  the  usual  jury,  chosen  by 
lot.  The  Praetor  would  himself  constitute  it,  choosing 
it  from  the  panel  of  judges.  It  was  hojjcd  in  this  way  to 
contrive  a  Court  which  would  condemn  Clodius  at 
least  to  exile. 


282   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

It  is  not  difficult  to  realise  how  daring  and  dangerous 
it  was  to  propose  such  a  privilegium,  as  the  Romans 
used  to  call  exceptional  laws,  in  times  of  uproar  like 
those,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  fierce  discords  which  al- 
ready for  so  many  reasons  were  splitting  up  the  Roman 
aristocracy.  But  the  indignation  and  commotion  of 
the  public,  superstitious  and  fearful  as  it  was,  were  too 
lively,  Caesar  himself  had  felt  the  necessity  of  throwing 
a  sop  to  the  public  by  divorcing  Pompeia ;  and  the  Sen- 
ate dared  not  reject  the  rash  proposal,  even  though 
many  wise  men,  like  Cicero,  thought  that  it  would  be 
more  prudent  to  let  Clodius  fry  in  his  own  grease. 
The  two  Consuls  were  invited  to  draft  the  law  and  to 
get  it  approved  by  the  people. 

From  this  moment,  however,  difficulties  began;  and, 
in  a  few  weeks,  the  prosecution  of  Clodius  assumed  a 
new  aspect.  It  became  a  political  matter.  That  the 
act  he  had  committed  was  an  abominable  one,  no  one  in 
Rome  denied;  but  that  in  order  to  secure  his  punish- 
ment a  law  should  be  passed  which  would  not  only  be  a 
special  one,  but — most  important  point  of  all — would 
introduce  the  principle  of  the  selection  of  judges  by  the 
Prastor,— no,  to  this  the  Popular,  Democratic  party 
could  not  consent.  i\lways  concerned  not  to  leave  in 
the  hands  of  Sulla's  party,  which  was  still  so  powerful  in 
the  Senate  and  throughout  the  Republic,  too  many 
weapons  to  employ  against  their  enemies,  the  Popular 
party  had  recently  taken  to  demanding  with  the  utmost 
emphasis  the  most  rigorous  observance  of  legal  forms, 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  283 

especially  in  proceedings  in  the  law-courts,  which  were 
such  a  convenient  means,  in  the  hands  of  the  preponder- 
ant party,  of  getting  rid  of  the  latter's  adversaries.  In 
fact,  at  that  moment  the  Popular  party  had  begun  an 
agitation  against  the  illegalities  committed  in  the 
course  of  the  repression  of  Catiline's  conspiracy. 
This  law,  therefore,  sounded  like  a  challenge.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  of  the  two  Consuls  whose  duty  it  was  to 
bring  it  forward,  one,  Marcus  Pupius  Piso,  though  he 
had  not  dared  resist  the  proposal  openly  in  the  Senate, 
was  opposed  to  it ;  and,  while  he  made  a  show  of  obeying 
the  orders  of  the  Senate  and  actually  did,  with  his 
colleague,  propose  the  law,  he  busied  himself  behind 
the  scenes  to  secure  its  rejection.  The  other  Consul, 
IMarcus  Valerius  Messala,  on  the  other  hand,  was  an 
enthusiastic  supporter  of  the  law;  but  it  was  whispered 
about  that  a  tribune  of  the  plchs,  if  the  law  was  brought 
forward,  would  veto  it.  Clodius  and  his  relations 
worked  away  vigorously.  All  the  wise  and  prudent 
men,  even  Cicero,  held  themselves  in  reserve,  keeping 
an  eye  on  the  progress  of  events  without  compromising 
themselves  too  far;  so  that  Cicero,  writing  at  the  end  of 
January,  61 ,  to  Atticus,  could  give  him  to  understand  be- 
tween the  lines  that  the  law  would  never  be  passed,  and 
that  the  whole  business  would  be  brought  to  a  stand- 
still by  the  fizzing  away  of  the  public  anger.  For  the 
rest,  this  was  the  secret  wish  of  all  ]e\'el-hcaded  citizens, 
who.  like  Cicero,  feared  dreadful  calamities,  if  the  busi- 
ness were  allowed  to  assume  more  serious  proportions. 


284   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

But  all  the  wiseacres  reckoned  without  Cato  and  the 
Pietist  party,  and  without  the  obstinacy  of  Messala, 
who,  irritated  by  the  stolid  opposition  of  his  colleague, 
countered  it  with  a  determined  effort  to  get  the  law 
passed.  Between  them  all,  they  worked  and  spoke 
with  such  effect  that  they  succeeded  in  obtaining  the 
support  of  Pompey,  and  in  bringing  the  law  before  the 
comitia  in  the  first  fortnight  of  February.  Piso,  how- 
ever, was  no  less  resolutely  determined  than  Messala 
that  the  law  he  had  proposed  should  not  be  passed,  and, 
as  it  was  his  turn  to  preside  over  the  meeting,  he  had 
recourse  that  day  to  every  sort  of  subtle  device  to 
prevent  the  law  being  passed.  He  even  went  so  far  as 
to  distribute  to  the  voters  only  that  tablet  which  they 
would  use  in  rejecting  the  law.  When  the  heads  of  the 
Conservative  party,  Cato,  Hortensius,  and  Favonius, 
heard  of  this  extraordinary  intrigue,  they  hurried  to  the 
comitia  and  began  to  address  the  people.  Cato  dis- 
tinguished himself  by  a  virulent  attack  on  Piso.  The 
speeches  were  effectual  in  preventing  the  law  from  being 
put  to  the  vote,  and  therefore  from  being,  as  it  assuredly 
would  have  been,  rejected.  They  could  not,  however, 
procure  its  approval,  which,  from  Clodius's  point  of 
view,  and  for  the  moment  at  any  rate,  came  to  much  the 
same  thing. 

Men's  passions  began  to  gQ:L  the  better  of  them.  The 
amour  propre  of  the  two  small  factions  came  more 
prominently  into  play  the  more  the  case  assumed  a 
political  aspect.     Inasmuch  as  the  opposition  of  one 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  2S5 

of  the  two  Consuls  who  had  proposed  the  law  was  the 
greatest  impediment  to  the  approval  of  the  law,  means 
must  be  found  for  getting  rid  of  Piso.  The  Pietists 
thought  of  exerting  pressure  upon  him  by  means  of  the 
Senate.  They  summoned  a  meeting  of  the  Senate  on 
urgent  business,  and  proposed  a  motion  inviting  the 
Consuls  once  more  to  join  in  recommending  the  law  to 
the  popular  vote;  in  other  words,  intimating  to  Piso 
that  he  had  better  abandon  his  attitude  of  obstruction. 
A  lively  discussion  ensued.  The  friends  of  Clodius 
opposed  the  motion  with  great  energy;  but  it  was 
carried  by  four  hundred  votes  to  fifteen.  A  truly 
crushing  majority !  Clodius's  act  was  so  offensive  to  the 
public  that  few  Senators  dared  openly  to  side  with 
him,  even  though  they  were  conscious  that  the  law 
which  was  meant  to  bring  him  to  book  was  fraught 
with  danger. 

Piso,  however,  did  not  allow  this  vote  of  the  Senate 
to  influence  him.  The  discontent  of  the  Popular  party 
was  increasing,  and  the  public  agitation,  not  in  favour 
of  Clodius,  but  against  the  law,  was  gathering  force, 
being  focussed  on  that  particular  provision  which 
undoubtedly  was  the  most  dangerous,  namely,  the 
authority  given  to  the  Praetor  to  choose  the  judges 
from  the  panel  of  jurors  instead  of  entr.usting  the  choice 
to  the  fortune  of  the  lot.  The  law,  it  is  true,  established 
this  procedure  only  for  the  purposes  of  the  action 
against  Clodius.  But  was  not  the  precedent  a  danger- 
ous one?     Would  it   not  be  possible,   after  this  first 


286   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

experiment,  to  try  to  apply  the  same  method  to  other 
cases?  That  would  result  in  putting  into  the  hands  of 
the  preponderant  party  a  formidable  weapon  for  the 
destruction  of  its  adversaries :  the  giving  to  the  Praetor 
in  office  the  power  to  choose  the  judges  who  should  be 
summoned  to  decide  the  numberless  cases  by  means  of 
which  that  party  sought  to  deprive  their  rivals  of  their 
most  influential  leaders. 

So  the  struggle  waxed  fiercer  and  fiercer.  Piso 
would  not  give  way,  and  the  Popular  party  supported 
him,  never  mentioning  Clodius,  but  asserting  that  the 
law  was  unjust,  dangerous,  and  deadly — that  the 
death-blow  would  be  given  to  the  Republic  on  the  day 
on  which  a  magistrate,  elected  by,  and  bound  by  ties  to, 
one  party,  M^as  invested  with  the  power  to  choose  the 
judges  for  every  law-suit.  The  Pietist  party,  supported 
by  the  majority  of  the  Senate,  and  by  the  Sullan 
association,  adopted  the  opposite  tactics.  It  made 
light  of  the  provisions  of  the  law  and  the  dangers 
anticipated  and  denounced  by  the  Popular  party.  It 
protested  that  Clodius  had  committed  a  horrible 
sacrilege,  and  could  not  be  allowed  to  go  unpunished 
without  compromising  still  further  in  the  eyes  of  the 
disgusted  and  affrighted  masses  the  waning  authority 
of  the  State.  Intrigues  and  plots  thickened  on  this  side 
and  on  that.  Both  sides  endeavoured  to  influence  pub- 
lic op)inion,  but  in  this  attempt  the  Popular  party  was 
the  more  successful.  For  that  party,  by  dint  of  dogged 
and  dexterous  efforts,  and  without  paying  any  regard 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  287 

to  the  votes  of  the  Senate,  which  was  almost  unani- 
mously favourable  to  the  opposite  party,  succeeded  in 
persuading  the  public  that  the  law  was  immoderate, 
tyrannical,  and  dangerous,  especially  in  the  matter  of 
the  powers  entrusted  to  the  Praetor. 

The  day  arrived  when  the  'more  enlightened  men  of 
the  Conservative  party  realised  that  the  law,  in  the  form 
in  which  it  had  been  drafted,  would  never  be  approved. 
Piso  by  himself,  helped  by  the  Popular  party  and  by  the 
growing  mistrust  of  public  opinion,  sufficed  to  check- 
mate the  majority  of  the  Senate  and  the  party  in  power. 
It  was  necessary,  therefore,  to  devise  a  compromise. 
And  the  man  who  devised  it  was  Hortensius,  the  great 
orator  who  ten  years  before  had  been  Verres's  defending 
counsel.  He  proposed  that  the  two  Consuls  should 
abandon  their  law;  and  that  Fusius  Calenus,  who  was 
tribune  of  the  plehs,  should  bring  forward  another,  in 
which  the  first  part  of  the  preceding  law,  that  which 
made  of  Clodius's  act  an  incest,  should  be  retained, 
but  the  second  part  should  be  modified  in  such  a  way 
that  the  judges  summoned  to  administer  it  should  not 
be  the  College  of  Pontiffs  but  the  ordinary  jury,  chosen 
in  the  ordinary  way,  that  is  to  say,  by  lot,  and  not,  as 
the  law  of  the  two  Consuls  proposed,  by  the  Praetors. 
By  this  equable  compromise  Hortensius  hoped  to 
satisfy  all  parties— he  disarmed  the  opposition  of  the 
Popular  party,  which  would  not  dare,  now  that  the 
law  had  been  purged  of  the  provision  which  aroused 
the  greatest   mistrust  in  the  public,   to  persist  in  its 


288   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

opposition,  and  to  risk  appearing  too  openly  to  desire 
the  protection  of  Clodius.  He  gave  a  sop  to  public 
opinion,  which  was  deeply  stirred  and  offended  by  the 
scandal.  He  gave  satisfaction  to  the  amour  propre 
of  the  Conservative  party,  by  presenting  them  with  the 
head  of  Clodius.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  thought — and 
this  was  the  argument  he  used  to  persuade  the  most 
recalcitrant  of  the  Pietist  party — that  it  was  not 
necessary  to  alter  the  mode  of  choosing  the  judges. 
Clodius's  guilt  was  so  evident  that  it  was  quite  impos- 
sible to  imagine  that  a  court  of  law,  however  corrupt, 
could  acquit  him. 

The  first  of  Hortensius's  anticipations  quickly  came 
true.  The  law,  thus  modified,  passed  without  difficulty. 
At  once,  several  citizens  hastened  to  indict  Clodius 
of  incest.  Matters  had  not  gone  far,  however,  before 
everyone  perceived  that  Hortensius's  second  antici- 
pation, that  the  conviction  of  Clodius  was  inevitable, 
would  not  be  realised  so  easily.  Months  had  passed; 
the  first  impression  of  horror  made  on  the  public  had 
faded.  The  Conservative  party — the  same  that  had 
made  such  efforts  to  save  Verres — was  too  deeply 
committed  to  obtaining  the  conviction  of  Clodius  at 
whatever  cost,  for  the  Popular  party  not  to  take  Clodius 
under  its  protection,  though  it  did  so  covertly  and 
without  compromising  itself  too  far.  Crassus  and 
Cassar  in  particular,  without  appearing  on  the  scene, 
were  disposed  to  do  whatever  they  could,  to  help 
Clodius,  and  to  procure  him,  if  it  were  possible,  an 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  289 

acquittal,  an  outcome  which  in  no  less  a  degree  than 
the  conviction  of  Verres,  would  have  been  a  rebuff  for 
the  party  which  Sulla  had  installed  in  the  government, 
and  which,  notwithstanding  all  the  reverses  which  it 
had  undergone  in  recent  years,  was  still  so  powerful. 
Clodius  on  his  side  worked  with  the  energy  of  despair 
to  escape  conviction,  which  would  have  shattered  his 
political  career  irreparably  and  forever. 

The  trial  took  place  at  the  beginning  of  May,  in  the 
midst  of  a  curiosity  and  excitement  which  may  be  easily 
imagined.  The  two  parties  had  by  now  decided  to  face 
each  other  once  again,  as  in  Verres's  time,  in  the  con- 
fined arena  of  a  law-court.  The  judges  were  chosen  by 
lot,  and  the  defendant  especially  availed  himself  of  the 
right  which  the  law  conceded  to  both  sides,  of  challeng- 
ing a  certain  number  of  them.  Nobody  was  surprised 
at  this,  as  everyone  knew  that  the  struggle  would  be  a 
fierce  one,  or  rather  a  hopeless  one,  for  the  accused. 
Indeed,  how  could  Clodius  escape  conviction,  when  his 
guilt  was  so  manifest?  In  declaring  his  act  to  be 
incestum,  the  law  had  already  condemned  him  in 
anticipation.  When,  however,  the  jury  had  been 
impannelled,  and  the  trial  opened,  an  unexpected  and 
dramatic  incident  occurred.  Clodius  defended  him- 
self by  saying  that  the  matrons  present  at  the  feast 
in  honour  of  the  Bona  Dea  had  been  deceived.  They 
had  mistaken  somebod}'-  else  for  him.  On  that  day  he 
was  actually  not  in  Rome,  but  at  Itcramna  (Terni) ! 

Just  at  first,  this  alibi  made  the  public  laugh.     No- 


290   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

body  took  it  seriously.  It  seemed  to  everyone  that 
Clodius  was  joking  and  wished  to  make  fun  of  the  Court, 
or  that  he  was  trying  a  desperate  coup.  But  here,  too, 
they  were  wrong.  Clodius  intended  that  his  point  be 
taken  quite  seriously,  and  had  prepared  his  defence 
much  more  cleverly  than  his  adversaries,  emboldened 
by  the  certainty  of  victory,  supposed.  People  were 
not  slow  to  realise  this,  as  the  trial  went  on  and  on, 
without  producing  that  proof  of  Clodius's  guilt  which 
everybody  thought  so  easy  and  certain,  and  without 
destroying  his  daring  alibi.  The  first  step  was  to  put 
Clodius's  slaves  to  the  torture, — a  step  which  was 
allowed  in  a  case  in  which  "incest "  was  imputed.  This 
procedure  was,  however,  barren  of  results.  Clodius 
had  sent  the  five  slaves  of  whose  evidence  he  was 
particularly  afraid,  partly  to  his  brother  in  Greece,  and 
partly  to  a  distant  property  of  his  in  the  Alps.  Then 
came  CcEsar,  who  had  been  cited  as  a  witness,  and  by 
whose  evidence  also  the  enemies  of  Clodius  set  great 
store.  Had  he  not  divorced  his  wife  immediately  after 
the  scandal?  This  divorce  clearly  indicated  that 
Caesar  considered  his  wife  guilty;  a  state  of  mind  which 
gave  ground  for  hope  that  he  would  revenge  himself 
by  charging  Clodius.  Ceesar,  however,  had  too  great  an 
interest  in  pleasing  Crassus,  w-hose  desire  to  give  the 
Democratic  party  the  satisfaction  of  procuring  the 
acquittal  of  Clodius  was  growing  keener  and  keener. 
So  Ccesar  deposed  under  examination  that  he  knew 
nothing  and  could  say  nothing,  as,  in  conformity  with 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  291 

religious  precepts,  he  was  out  of  the  house  that  evening. 
Great  was  the  irritation  and  disappointment  of  the 
prosecutors,  one  of  whom  thereupon,  in  order  to  put 
Caesar  in  a  difficulty,  asked  Caesar  for  what  reason,  if  he 
knew  nothing  and  could  say  nothing,  he  had  divorced 
his  wife  immediateh'^  after  the  scandal  had  broken  out. 
Cassar  then,  assuming  a  solemn  air,  pronounced  the 
famous  phrase:  "Because  Cassar's  wife  must  be  above 
suspicion, "  a  phrase  which  historians  have  proceeded  to 
quote  as  a  proof  of  his  precocious  monarchical  ambi- 
tions and  of  his  masterful  temperament.  On  the 
contrary,  the  phrase  was  merely  a  boutade,  devised  to 
elude  an  embarrassing  question  in  a  political  trial, 
which  none  of  those  who  heard  it  took  too  seriously,  and 
in  saying  which  Caesar  himself  knew  quite  well  that 
nobody  would  take  him  at  his  word.  In  fact,  the  public 
smiled  at  the  idea  of  the  elegant  and  debt-laden  dema- 
gogue, who  was  known  to  all  for  his  somewhat  free 
opinions  and  customs,  having  become  all  at  once  so 
jealous  of  the  spotless  reputation  of  his  house. 

At  any  rate,  as  a  loophole  the  answer  was  a  clever  one; 
and  the  prosecutors  could  not  press  the  question.  So 
Julia,  Caesar's  sister,  and  Aurelia,  his  mother,  came 
forward.  Both  deposed  that,  on  the  night  on  which 
the  mysteries  of  the  Bo7ia  Dea  were  celebrated,  a  man 
had  been  surprised  in  Caesar's  house;  but  that  they 
could  not  say  with  certainty  that  the  defendant  was  the 
man.  We  should  be  doing  an  injustice  to  the  memory 
of  the  two  noble  dames  if  we  suspected  that  this  evidence 


292   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

was  not  candid,  but  prompted  by  concern  for  the  political 
interests  and  friendships  of  their  brother  and  son. 
Is  it  not  probable  that,  in  the  confusion  and  disorder  of 
the  just-discovered  scandal,  neither  may  have  scrutin- 
ised the  man  in  female  disguise  with  so  much  attention 
and  particularity  as  to  be  able  to  recognise  him  sub- 
sequently in  court,  where  Clodius  denied  the  identity 
with  so  much  assurance?  Therefore  this  evidence 
also  was  in  Clodius's  favour;  for  there  was  nobody  who 
could  affirm  positively  that  the  man  surprised  in  the 
middle  of  the  rites  of  the  Bona  Dea  was  the  accused. 

Next  came  the  evidence  adduced  by  Clodius,  to 
prove  his  alibi.  It  took  the  form  of  a  certain  C. 
Causinius  Schola,  who  deposed  frankly  and  resolutely 
that  the  gentlemen  of  the  jury  might  take  it  from  him 
that  at  a  certain  hour  on  the  day  of  the  mysteries  of 
the  Bona  Dea,  he  had  conversed  with  Clodius  at  Iter- 
amna,  which  was  ninety  thousand  passi  distant  from 
Rome.  This  evidence,  after  that  of  Caesar,  Julia,  and 
Aurelia,  made  the  acquittal  of  Clodius  inevitable. 
Certain  proofs  of  his  guilt  there  were  none.  The 
improbable  alibi,  which  at  the  beginning  nobody  had 
taken  seriously,  threatened  to  triumph  owing  to  the 
doubts  and  scruples  of  a  few  witnesses,  the  adroit 
reticence  of  others,  and  thanks  to  the  subterranean 
workings  of  Clodius's  friends,  backed  by  Crassus's  gold. 

Then  came  a  second  and  even  more  unexpected  sur- 
prise. At  the  very  moment  when  Clodius  seemed  to 
have  emerged  victorious,  there  appeared  to  destroy  his 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  293 

alibi  .  .  .  Who?  Cicero  himself.  Cited  as  witness, 
Cicero  deposed  that  on  the  day  of  the  mysteries,  three 
hours  before  the  hour  at  which  Causinius  declared  that 
he  had  spoken  to  Clodius  at  Terni,  Clodius  had  come 
to  call  on  him  at  his  house  in  Rome!  What  had  hap- 
pened? Cicero  had  up  to  that  time  adopted  a  distinctly 
reserved  attitude,  making  it  clear  that  he,  who  since 
the  suppression  of  Catiline's  conspiracy  had  become 
one  of  the  leading  figures  in  the  State,  had  no  wish  to  be 
mixed  up  in  so  trivial  and  stupid  an  affair.  For  what 
reason  did  he  thus  hurl  himself  all  at  once,  at  the  close 
of  the  trial,  into  the  thick  of  the  fight,  and  opposing  his 
evidence  to  that  of  Causinius,  seem  to  challenge  the 
jury  to  choose  between  his  word — the  word  of  a  man  of 
consular  rank,  the  word  of  one  of  the  three  or  four  most 
famous  men  in  the  Empire — and  that  of  this  obscure 
and  probably  corrupt  witness?  Had  he  yielded  to  the 
pressure  of  the  Conservative  party,  which,  realising  that 
the  prey  was  slipping  from  their  grasp,  had  wished  to 
make  a  supreme  attempt  to  destroy  the  alibi  which 
had  been  so  adroitly  prepared  by  Clodius?  Had  he, 
upright  and  honourable  man  as  he  was,  yielded  to  his 
disgust  at  seeing  a  comedy,  which  had  been  staged  with 
such  ability,  completely  successful?  Or  had  he  yielded 
to  pressure  and  to  considerations  of  the  sort  of  which 
Plutarch  speaks?  Plutarch  says  that  Cicero's  wife, 
Terentia,  was  jealous  of  Clodia,  Clodius's  sister,  whom 
she  suspected  of  having  cast  eyes  upon  Cicero ;  and  had 
so  much  worried  Cicero,  by  harping  upon  the  subject, 


294   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

and  accusing  him  of  sparing  Clodius  out  of  regard  for 
the  sister,  that  Cicero,  in  order  to  convince  her  that  her 
jealousy  was  groundless,  gave  the  evidence  he  did. 
Which  of  these  suppositions  Is  the  true  one  we  do  not 
know,  and  we  never  shall  know.  What,  however,  is 
certain  is  that  Cicero's  evidence  appeared  at  once  to  be 
the  death-blow  to  Clodius.  Clodius' s  defenders  per- 
ceived this  so  clearly  that  they  all  rose  in  their  seats, 
hurling  threats  and  insults  at  Cicero,  hoping  to  intimi- 
date him  and  to  obliterate  the  impression  made  by  his 
evidence.  Cicero  retorted  in  the  same  key.  One 
section  of  the  public,  that  favourable  to  Clodius, 
supported  the  advocates.  An  uproar  ensued.  The 
judges  rose  from  their  seats,  and  formed  a  circle  round 
Cicero,  as  If  to  defend  him.  It  seemed  for  one  moment 
that  the  partisans  were  coming  to  blows.  In  short, 
the  whole  affair  was  a  scandal,  but  one  which  made 
Clodius's  position  even  more  grave.  Everyone  realised 
that  he  considered  himself  lost.  Was  it,  In  truth, 
possible  that  the  jury  should  hesitate  between  Cicero's 
asseveration  and  that  of  Causlnius?  Clodius  himself, 
as  soon  as  the  uproar  had  quieted  down,  realised  that 
he  could  not  accuse  Cicero,  a  man  of  such  authority,  of 
lying.  Indeed,  he  did  not  deny  that  the  fact  was  as 
stated;  but  he  said  that  after  having  spoken  with 
Cicero  he  had  immediately  left  Rome  for  Ternl.  To 
which  it  was  easy  to  reply  that  in  three  hours  one  cannot 
cover  a  distance  of  ninety  thousand  passi;  and  this 
reply  did  not  admit  of  answer,  confutation,  or  sophistica- 


The  Trial  of  Clodlus  295 

tion.  The  falseness  of  the  aHbi  was  the  gravest  of 
proofs  against  Clodius,  and  that  which  was  bound  to 
compromise  his  cause  most  gravely  in  the  opinion  of  the 
public  and  of  the  judges. 

On  the  evening  of  the  day  on  which  Cicero  gave  his 
evidence,  there  was  not  a  soul  in  Rome  who  did  not 
think  that  the  great  orator  had  dealt  the  youthful  and 
turbulent  patrician  his  coup  de  grace.  But  Cicero's 
evidence,  the  tumult  and  threats  which  had  succeeded, 
the  self-assurance  of  the  Conservatives,  who  were  now 
confident  of  securing  a  conviction,  only  intensified  the 
bitterness  of  public  feeling.  Strange  rumours  and 
whispers  began  to  circulate  through  Rome,  originating 
no  one  knew  where.  It  was  said  that,  on  the  day  the 
verdict  was  given,  blood  would  flow  amid  scenes  of 
terrible  violence.  Some  of  the  judges  took  fright  and 
asked  the  Senate  for  the  protection  of  an  armed  body- 
guard, which  the  Senate  gave  them.  Round  Cicero  the 
Conservative  party  organised  a  kind  of  permanent 
demonstration,  arranging  that  he  should  be  accompa- 
nied everywhere  by  a  number  of  friends  read}'  to  de- 
fend him.  The  idea  was  to  persuade  the  public  in 
every  possible  way  that  Clodius  intended  to  sneak  away, 
or  even  to  use  violence,  so  sure  was  he  of  conviction, 
to  shackle  the  free  judgment  of  the  Court.  That 
conviction  was  a  certainty  was  the  general  opinion.  In 
the  midst  of  these  rumours,  fears,  and  suspicions  the 
case  drew  rapidly  to  a  close.  In  the  crowded  Forum, 
surrounded  by  the  swords  of  the  bodyguard  supplied 


296   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

by  the  Senate  for  the  protection  of  the  judges,  the 
Court  finally  pronounced  its  verdict — but  how 
different  it  was  from  that  which  was  universally 
expected.  By  thirty-one  votes  to  twenty-five  Clodius 
was  acquitted! 

The  surpise,  the  scandal,  the  jubilation,  the  amuse- 
ment, according  to  each  man's  disposition  and  party, 
were  great  in  Rome  when  this  result  was  announced. 
In  truth,  whoever,  after  the  lapse  of  so  many  centuries, 
reads  the  history  of  the  trial  will  find  no  difficulty  in 
believing  Cicero  when  he  accuses  Crassus  of  having 
secured  Clodius's  acquittal  by  the  exercise  of  pressure 
and  corruption.  In  no  other  way  can  be  explained 
the  fact  that  a  Roman  Court  of  law,  forced  to  choose 
between  Cicero  and  Causinius,  believed  Causinius. 
Nevertheless,  it  is  certain  that  Clodius  was  much  helped 
in  this  struggle  by  the  political  mistakes  of  the  Con- 
servative party,  by  their  blind  relentlessness,  and 
by  the  obstinacy  with  which  they  had  endeavoured 
for  so  long  to  bring  about,  to  the  detriment  of  Clodius, 
a  change  in  the  method  of  choosing  the  judges.  At  this 
epoch,  justice  in  Rome  was  much  too  much  exposed  to 
the  influence  of  politics.  If,  however,  the  times  were 
disturbed,  if  the  parties  were  divided  by  acute  discord 
and  men's  minds  inflamed  by  the  memories  of  a  terrible 
civil  war,  the  sense  of  justice  was,  nevertheless,  not  yet 
so  much  blunted  by  party  passions  as  to  allow  the 
dominant  party  to  abuse  their  own  power  beyond  a 
certain  point.     Clodius  might  be  a  man  Httle  deserving 


The  Trial  of  Clodius  297 

of  public  interest;  but  there  were  many  persons  in 
Rome  to  whom  it  was  repugnant  that,  even  for  the 
purpose  of  punishing  a  sacrilege,  recourse  should  be 
had  to  means  so  unusual,  revolutionary,  and  extreme. 

So  the  Popular  party,  with  the  support  of  the 
general  sentiment  of  legality,  had  succeeded  in  check- 
mating the  Conservative  party,  the  Sullan  association. 
The  checkmate  in  itself  was,  however,  not  a  serious 
one,  because  the  trial  of  Clodius  had  not  been  so 
important  and  complex  that  his  acquittal  could  seri- 
ously weaken  the  strength  of  the  Conservative  party. 
The  indirect  consequences,  on  the  other  hand,  were 
most  serious.  The  first  was  that  Clodius  went  over 
body  and  soul  to  the  Popular  party,  and  became  the 
boldest  and  most  violent  of  its  leaders.  If  the  Con- 
servative party  had  followed  Cicero's  advice  and 
abandoned  Clodius  to  the  infamy  which  his  act  must 
have  brought  upon  him,  there  would  have  been  an  end 
of  Clodius.  The  man  who  had  profaned  the  mysteries 
of  the  Bona  Dea  would  not  have  dared  to  show  him- 
self any  more  in  public.  By  persecuting  him  as  it  did, 
and  by  giving  him  the  chance  of  posing  before  the 
public  as  the  victim  of  its  persecutions,  this  unpopular 
party  saved  his  career,  or  at  least  helped  to  enable  him 
to  continue  to  play  a  part  in  the  political  world  of  Rome, 
and  a  part  fraught  with  danger  to  the  State.  Clodius, 
realising  that,  after  the  trial,  he  could  no  longer  hope 
for  anything  from  the  Conservative  party  in  which  he 
had  grown  up  and  in  whose  ranks  lie  h;ul  fought,  turned 


298   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

to  the  Popular  party ;  and,  in  order  to  make  that  party- 
forget  his  origin,  his  relations,  and  the  Bona  Dea 
scandal,  became  the  most  violent  and  turbulent  of  its 
chiefs.  It  is  this  trial  which  has  made  of  Clodius  the 
famous  demagogue  of  whom  history  tells,  who  in  a  few 
years  contributed  so  much,  with  his  agitations,  his 
laws,  his  violent  acts,  and  his  enmities,  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  little  order  and  concord  that  were  left  in 
the  Republic.  The  most  violent  of  his  enmities  was 
that  which  he  entertained  for  Cicero.  From  this  trial 
dates  the  deadly  enmity  between  the  two,  which  was 
not  the  least  of  the  causes  of  the  great  disorder  into 
which  the  Republic  fell,  which  gave  birth  to  the  civil  war. 
The  trial  of  Clodius  is,  then,  one  of  the  events  which 
paved  the  way  for  the  catastrophe  of  the  Republic. 
What  an  object  lesson  it  is  for  political  parties !  In  the 
excitement  of  the  struggle,  such  parties  reck  nothing, 
while  they  deal  each  other  slashing  blows,  of  the  hatred 
and  rancour  which  they  sow  broadcast.  But  this 
hatred  and  rancour  undermine  in  men's  minds  the  senti- 
ments of  concord,  loyalty,  moderation,  tolerance,  and 
equity,  without  which  the  social  order  cannot  in  the 
long  run  subsist;  it  is  one  of  the  most  potent  causes  of 
the  great  catastrophes  of  history.  A  revolution  is 
usually  only  the  ultimate  effect  of  a  long  succession 
of  violent  acts,  affronts,  and  injustices  which  have 
exasperated  the  public  mind,  in  which  feelings  of 
rancour  accumulate  and  ferment  until  one  day  they 
explode. 


Ill 

THE   TRIAL    OF    PISO 

jVT  EARLY  a  century  had  passed  since  the  trial  of 
*  ^  Verres,  and  more  than  eighty  years  since  the 
trial  of  Clodius.  The  quarrels  of  the  Roman  aristo- 
cracy, which  had  given  birth  to  those  two  extraordinary 
and  sensational  trials,  had  kindled  the  spark  of  two 
dreadful  civil  wars,  in  the  course  of  which  the  Empire 
had  narrowly  escaped  complete  dissolution.  Gradu- 
ally, however,  order  had  been  re-established.  From 
the  midst  of  the  discords  of  the  aristocracy,  one  family 
had  emerged  and  succeeded  in  acquiring  preponderating 
influence:  the  family  of  the  Cajsars.  First,  Augustus 
for  forty-two  years,  and,  for  the  three  years  succeeding 
his  death,  his  stepson  and  adopted  son  Tiberius,  had 
governed  the  State  as  principcs,  or  life-presidents, 
accumulating  in  their  own  hands  powers  of  the  most 
diverse  kinds — the  supreme  command  of  the  legions, 
the  prcsidenc}^  of  the  Senate,  the  high-priesthood,  the 
surveillance  of  the  most  important  provinces — and  at 
the  same  time  making  every  eftort  to  keep  the  ancient 
machinery  of  republican  government  working  with  as 

299 


300  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

little  friction  as  possible  under  such  widely  different 
conditions  and  in  control  of  an  empire  of  so  much 
vaster  extent.  No  law  had  laid  it  down  that  this  power 
should  be  hereditary ;  but  the  force  of  circumstances — 
the  exhaustion  of  the  ancient  nobility,  the  weakness 
of  the  Senate,  the  dying  out  of  all  the  parties  and 
all  the  powerful  cabals  which  for  centuries  had  bulked 
so  large  in  the  Republic — made  of  this  family,  little 
by  little,  the  mistress  of  the  Empire's  destinies. 

If,  however,  the  violent  disputes  of  parties  no  longer 
raged  in  the  Senate;  if  blows  were  no  longer  exchanged 
in  the  Forum  when  the  election  of  the  magistrates  or 
the  discussion  of  the  laws  was  toward;  if  the  threat  of 
civil  war  no  longer  hovered  continually  over  the  heads 
of  all,  concord  was  not,  for  all  that,  re-established  in 
the  ranks  of  the  aristocracy  which  surrounded  Cassar's 
family  and  which  ought  to  have  helped  that  family  to 
govern  the  immense  Empire.  Men's  feelings  were  as 
much  divided  as  ever,  though  for  different  motives. 
Tiberius,  the  second  princeps  in  three  years  chosen  by 
the  Senate  as  successor  of  Augustus,  was  hated  by  one 
section  of  the  Roman  aristocracy,  which  judged  him  too 
old-fashioned — too  closely  bound  to  the  traditions  of 
the  old  nobility  and  of  his  family,  the  Claudii ;  too  stern, 
hard,  and  rigid;  too  much  out  of  sympathy  with  the  new 
customs  and  new  refinements  that  were  beginning  to 
flow  from  Egypt  into  Italy ;  too  close-fisted  and  too  keen 
a  professor  of  a  scrupulous  and  strict  financial  policy; 
worst  of  all,  too  cautious  in  his  foreign  policy.. 


The  Trial  of  Piso  301 

An  old  warrior,  who  had  passed  the  best  years  of 
his  life  fighting  on  the  Rhine  and  the  Danube  against 
the  barbarians,  a  consummate  diplomat,  head  and 
shoulders  above  all  his  contemporaries  in  matters 
of  war  and  diplomacy,  Tiberius  had  convinced  himself 
that  Rome  had  not  strength  enough  to  extend  her 
empire  beyond  the  Rhine  and  the  Danube,  and  that, 
therefore,  she  ought  to  rest  content  with  the  empire 
which  she  had  already  won,  which  was,  after  all,  vast 
enough  for  a  tiny  aristocracy  like  that  which  was 
seated  at  Rome.  The  malcontents,  however, — and 
there  were  many  of  these,  especially  among  the  younger 
generation, — not  only  did  not  recognise  Tiberius's 
wisdom,  but  imputed  this  sagacious  prudence  of  his 
to  inexperience,  to  fear,  or  to  envy  of  the  young  and 
brilliant   Germanicus. 

The  son  of  Drusus,  the  brother  whom  Tiberius  had 
so  much  loved,  the  adopted  son  of  Tiberius,  who  had 
been  enjoined  by  Augustus  to  adopt  him,  intelligent, 
brilliant,  generous,  well-educated,  handsome,  affable, 
inclined  to  be  light-headed  and  casual  like  most  youths 
who  are  fortune's  favourites,  Germanicus  was  the  idol 
of  all  the  enemies  of  Tiberius.  He  was,  and  he  was 
conscious  of  being,  their  idol,  and,  without  assuming  too 
openly  an  attitude  of  opposition,  he  willingly  let  himself 
be  worshipped  and  extolled  by  the  faction  opposed  to 
his  adoptive  father,  which  faction  was  strong  enough  to 
exercise  an  effective  pressure  on  the  Senate  and  through- 
out  the  State.     In  fact,   Germanicus,   who  after  the 


302  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

death  of  Augustiis  had  been  sent  by  Tiberius  to  take 
command  of  the  legions  of  the  Rhine,  had  dared  to 
follow  a  poUcy  of  his  own,  differing  from  that  of  Ti- 
berius, on  the  Rhine,  crossing  the  great  river  on  his 
own  initiative,  and  making  a  long  and  hazardous  in- 
cursion into  the  territories  abandoned  by  Rome  after 
the  defeat  of  Varus. 

This  incursion — the  first  step  taken  by  Rome  to 
avenge  Varus  and  his  legions,  which  had  been  betrayed 
and  butchered  in  the  great  forest — had  evoked  such 
enthusiasm  in  Rome  and  in  Italy;  Germanicus  was  so 
popular;  the  expansionist  party,  always  strong  and 
now  reinforced  by  all  the  enemies  of  Tiberius,  had  made 
so  much  of  the  daring  act  of  the  young  general, 
that  Tiberius  had  not  dared  to  intervene,  to  repress, 
or  to  moderate  the  dashing  initiative  of  his  young 
nephew  and  adopted  son.  So  he  let  Germanicus  go 
on.  On  no  account  and  at  no  cost  would  Tiberius, 
however,  again  begin  beyond  the  Rhine  a  dangerous 
and  expensive  policy  of  provocation  and  expansion. 
Therefore,  after  having  allowed  Germanicus  to  cover 
himself  with  glory  through  his  expedition,  to  collect  and 
to  bury  in  the  great  forests  the  bones  of  the  butchered 
legions,  and  to  lay  waste  the  territories  of  the  tribes 
which  had  taken  part  in  the  war  against  Rome,  he 
called  him  back,  in  order  to  send  him — in  the  year  17 
of  the  Christian  era — to  the  East,  complications  and 
difficulties  having  arisen  in  Cappadocia  and  Armenia. 
He  was  not  prepared  to  leave  this  ambitious,  active, 


The  Trial  of  Piso  303 

bold  youth,  the  tool  of  his  own  enemies,  too  long  at 
grijjs  with  the  warlike  German  tribes.  He  was  afraid 
that  the  all-powerful  craving  for  glory  might  lead 
Germanicus  to  provoke  in  the  end  some  great  and 
dangerous  war.  In  Rome,  the  party  which  favoured 
the  reconquest  of  Germany  was  still  powerful.  Ti- 
berius did  not  want  to  reconquer  that  region.  In  the 
East,  amongst  unwarlike  nations,  the  danger  was  less 
urgent. 

So  Germanicus  was  sent  to  the  East — but,  by  way  of 
compensation  for  his  recall,  he  was  given  unusually  large 
powers.  When  the  time  came  to  approve  the  decree 
which  conferred  these  powers  upon  him,  the  party  of 
his  friends  in  the  Senate  proposed  and  carried  a  motion 
giving  him  power  overriding  that  of  all  the  governors  of 
the  separate  provinces  of  the  whole  East;  the  result 
being  that  he  was  constituted  a  sort  of  governor-general 
or  even  viceroy.  Whether  Tiberius  was  personally  in 
favour  of  this  decree,  which  placed  half  the  Empire 
in  the  absolute  power  of  a  young  man  of  little  more  than 
thirty  years  of  age,  or  not,  we  do  not  know.  The 
probability  is  that  he  was  not,  and  that  on  this  occasion 
also  Tiberius  was  the  victim  of  the  intrigues  and  cabals 
of  the  party  which  favoured  his  nephew  and  adopted 
son.  It  was  very  difficult  for  him  to  oppose  laws  which 
heaped  honours  on  the  public  darling,  Germanicus, 
because  the  public  imputed  his  opposition  to  base 
motives,  such  as  jealousy,  envy,  or  the  fear  of  opposi- 
tion.    What  is  certain,  at  any  rate,  is  that,  after  this 


304   Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

decree,  Tiberius  suddenly  changed  the  governor  in 
Syria,  the  most  important  province  in  the  East,  the 
choice  of  whose  governors  rested  with  him.  He  re- 
placed the  mediocre  person  who  then  occupied  the  post 
by  a  first-rate  man,  Cneius  Piso,  a  descendant  of  one  of 
the  most  noble  Roman  families,  of  a  family  which  had 
distinguished  itself  in  the  civil  wars  by  its  aversion  to 
the  Caesarian  party;  of  a  family,  in  short,  which  was 
aristocratic,  traditionalist,  and  conservative  to  the 
core.  Cneius  Piso  himself  was  a  determined,  con- 
servative, and  energetic  man,  a  firm  partisan  of  the  old 
policy  with  which  Rome  had  kept  in  subjection  and 
governed  so  many  nations  for  hundreds  of  years. 

Tiberius's  idea  is  quite  clear  to  anyone  who  examines 
it  impartially.  He  did  not  wish  to  leave  the  East  at  the 
mercy  of  Germanicus,  who  was  intelligent  and  good,  but 
still  young,  inexperienced,  and  not  always  deliberate, 
and  who  was  easily  influenced  by  light-headed,  irre- 
sponsible, and  often  vicious  and  corrupt  flatterers. 
He  wished  to  place,  at  Germanicus's  elbow  in  the 
East,  a  serious,  mature,  energetic,  and  cautious  man; 
a  man  who  could,  so  to  speak,  counterbalance  him, 
retrieve  his  more  serious  mistakes,  keep  an  eye  on  every- 
thing he  did  or  said,  and  in  every  case  warn  him  in  time 
of  the  more  grave  eventualities.  Can  we  label  such  a 
device  a  crime?  Or  the  sinister  expression  of  a  morbid 
jealousy,  as  Tacitus  would  have  us  do  ?  Was  it  not  rather 
the  wise  precaution  of  a  cautious  statesman,  who  did 
not  wish  to  rob  an  intelligent  youth  of  the  opportunities 


The  Trial  of  Piso  3^5 

of  distinguishing  himself  and  of  becoming  proficient 
in  the  government  of  a  world  which  would,  perhaps, 
one  day  devolve  upon  him,  though  Tiberius  was  at  the 
same  time  anxious  that  the  other's  inexperience  should 
not  involve  too  much  danger  to  the  Empire  and  to 
himself?  But  the  wisest  precautions  are  on  occasions 
the  seed  of  disasters  of  the  first  magnitude. 

And  so  they  were  in  this  case.  In  the  year  i8  A.D., 
Germanicus  and  Piso  started,  one  after  the  other,  at  a 
short  interval  of  time,  for  the  East,  but  they  lost  no 
time  in  coming  to  loggerheads.  The  first  incident 
occurred  at  Athens,  which  first  Germanicus,  and  then 
Piso,  made  a  stage  in  the  journey.  Germanicus,  who 
was  an  ardent  admirer  of  Greek  culture,  had  wished  to 
do  honour  in  every  possible  way  to  the  great  city  in 
which  the  fire  of  ancient  culture  had  burned  with  the 
most  dazzling  brightness.  He  had  entered  Athens 
almost  like  a  private  person,  with  only  one  lictor  in 
attendance;  and  had  exchanged  the  most  flowery  and 
amiable  speeches  with  the  magistrates  of  the  city. 
This  attitude,  however,  had  seemed  too  affable  to  a 
Roman  of  the  old  stamp,  like  Piso,  who  considered  that 
the  representative  of  the  power  of  Rome  ought  never 
to  repose  too  great  authority  and  confidence  in  the 
subject  nations  and  cities,  even  if  they  called  themselves 
Greece  and  Athens,  and  could  pride  themselves  on 
having  listened  to  Socrates  and  on  having  been  the  first 
to  applaud  the  tragedies  of  Sophocles  and  Euripides. 
So  Piso  also  stopped  at  Athens,  but  with  the  object 


3o6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

of  cancelling  by  a  brusque  and  harsh  demeanour  the 
impression  which  might  have  been  made  by  the  impru- 
dent affability  of  Germanicus.  He,  in  his  turn,  made  a 
speech,  full  of  stern  reproof  and  almost  veiled  threats 
to  the  Athenians,  which  seemed  to  everybody  to  be  a 
disavowal  of  the  speeches  of  Germanicus;  as  if  Piso 
intended  to  convey  to  the  people  of  Athens  that  Ger- 
manicus had  spoken  on  his  own  account  and  not  in  the 
name  of  the  Roman  government. 

Germanicus  was  an  impressionable  young  man,  but 
really  kind-hearted  and  conciliatory.  He  did  not  take, 
in  bad  part,  the  kind  of  disavowal  which  Piso  had  in- 
flicted on  him,  all  the  more  because  he  knew  that  Piso 
was  the  mouthpiece  of  a  perhaps  harsh  version  of  the 
admonitions  of  Tiberius's  experienced  wisdom.  Round 
Germanicus,  however,  there  stood  a  large  party  of 
flatterers  and  intriguers  who  had  fixed  on  him  as  the 
future  emperor — Tiberius  was  already  an  old  man — ; 
also,  Germanicus  had  to  wife  Agrippina,  a  virtuous  and 
highly  educated  woman,  who  loved  and  admired  him 
intensely,  but  was  at  the  same  time  very  ambitious, 
passionate,  and  uncritical,  prone  to  mistake  for  just 
and  wise  everything  which  appeased  her  ardent  and  not 
ungenerous  passions.  Piso  was  accompanied  to  the 
East  by  his  wife,  Plancina,  a  great  friend  of  Livia, 
Tiberius's  mother,  and  a  great  enemy  of  Agrippina. 
The  interested  flatteries  of  friends,  the  fiery  tempera- 
ment of  Agrippina,  her  blind  love  for  her  husband,  and 
her  hatred  for  Plancina,  in  a  short  time  transformed 


The  Trial  of  Piso  3^7 

into  a  violent  personal  conflict  what  Tiberius  had 
intended  to  be  a  discreet  collaboration  between  a  man 
of  ripe  age  and  experience,  and  a  young  man  full  of 
good  intentions  but  at  limes  lacking  in  ballast. 

For  the  rest,  the  matters  which  Germanicus  and  Piso 
had  been  sent  to  the  East  to  settle  were  complicated 
and  difficult,  and  therefore  afforded  countless  oppor- 
tunities and  pretexts  for  quarrels.  Rome  found  herself 
involved  in  a  grave  difficulty  in  the  East.  Some  years 
before,  the  Parthians,  left  without  a  king,  had  sent  to 
Italy  for  Vonones,  a  son  of  their  old  King  Phraates,  who 
had  been  educated  in  Rome  at  the  house  of  Augustus. 
To  have  at  the  head  of  the  Parthian  Empire  a  king  who 
had  been  educated  on  the  banks  of  the  Tiber  was  a 
stroke  of  luck  for  Rome.  The  Parthians,  however, 
very  soon  discovered  that  Vonones  had  become  too 
much  Latinised  at  Rome,  and  had  forgotten  too  com- 
pletely the  ideas  and  customs  of  his  nation.  Con- 
sequently, they  had  turned  him  out  and  elected  in  his 
stead  Artabanus.  Vonones  had  fled  to  Armenia,  and 
had  succeeded  in  getting  elected  King  of  the  Armenians. 
But  Artabanus,  not  wishing  his  predecessor  to  become 
king  of  a  vast  empire  marching  with  his  own,  from 
which  he  might  retrieve  in  due  course  the  crown  of  the 
Parthians,  had  succeeded  also  by  means  of  various 
intrigues  and  threats  in  getting  Vonones  expelled  from 
Armenia. 

The  difficulty  which  Tiberius  had  charged  Germani- 
cus and  Piso  to  study  and  resolve  on  the   spot  was 


3o8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

actually  this:  whether  Rome  should  or  should  not  give 
ear  to  Vonones's  clamour  and  replace  him  on  the  throne 
of  Armenia.  The  difficulty  was  a  serious  one,  as  each  of 
the  two  opposing  courses  promised  grave  dangers.  By 
replacing  Vonones  on  the  throne  of  Armenia,  Rome 
might  implicate  herself  in  serious  quarrels,  and  perhaps 
in  a  war,  with  the  King  of  the  Parthians,  who  was 
opposed  to  Vonones's  restoration.  By  not  replacing 
him,  Rome  appeared  to  sacrifice  to  the  hatred  of  the 
Parthian  King  this  faithful  client  of  hers,  whose  only 
fault  was  that  he  had  been  educated  in  Rome;  to  be 
inclined  to  recognise  that  a  prince  who  had  been  too 
thoroughly  Romanised  could  not  govern  an  Oriental 
state, — a  confession  which  certainly  would  not  encour- 
age the  protected  sovereigns  of  Asia,  great  and  small, 
to  bring  themselves  too  closely  into  touch  with  the 
affairs,  ideas,  and  customs  of  the  protecting  state.  In 
point  of  fact,  Germanicus  and  Piso,  who  were  already 
embittered  against  each  other  by  the  incidents  at 
Athens,  came  into  open  conflict  on  this  point.  Ger- 
manicus and  his  supporters  were  in  favour  of  sacrificing 
Vonones  to  the  resentment  of  the  King  of  the  Parthians 
and  to  the  national  susceptibilities  of  the  East;  while 
Piso,  more  loyal  to  the  authoritative  traditions  of 
the  old  Roman  policy,  which  were  faithfully  reflected  in 
his  own  more  cautious  judgment,  decided  to  defend 
Vonones.  Rome  must  not  abandon  the  cause  of  this 
her  faithful  servant  in  the  East ! 

Germanicus  had,  by  virtue  of  a  decree  of  the  Senate, 


The  Trial  of  Piso  309 

supreme  powers  in  the  East;  as  a  result  his  opinion 
carried  the  day,  notwithstanding  all  the  efforts  that 
Piso  made  to  prevent  his  sacrificing  Vonones,  whom 
Piso  by  way  of  compensation  entertained,  treated  with 
honour,  and  openly  took  under  his  protection.  Towards 
the  middle  of  the  year  18,  Germanicus  crowned  Zenon 
King  of  the  Armenians  in  Artaxata,  a  son  of  Polemon, 
King  of  Pontus.  When,  however,  Germanicus  asked 
Piso  to  send  into  Armenia  a  section  of  the  legions  placed 
under  his  command,  to  make  an  armed  demonstration 
in  favour  of  the  new  sovereign,  Piso  refused.  Theoreti- 
cally and  by  virtue  of  the  decrees  of  the  Senate,  Ger- 
manicus had  the  right  to  give  orders  to  Piso,  and  Piso 
ought  to  have  obeyed  them.  On  the  other  hand, 
Piso  represented  Tiberius;  and  with  Germanicus,  as 
with  ever}^  other  human  authority,  it  was  not  enough 
to  possess  the  power,  there  was  needed  also  the  hardi- 
hood to  use  it.  In  the  face  of  Piso's  energy  and  the 
authority  of  Tiberius,  who  stood  behind  Piso,  Germani- 
cus did  not  dare  to  insist. 

It  is  easy,  however,  to  picture  the  fury  and  rage  of 
Germanicus's  friends  and  flatterers,  to  whom  this 
kind  of  surveillance  to  which  Germanicus  was  sub- 
jected became  more  intolerable,  the  more  it  limited 
indirectly  their  own  authority.  In  their  fury,  they 
determined  to  have  their  revenge,  and  they  were  not 
long  in  finding  an  opportunity,  though  it  cost  them  dear. 
Artabanus,  the  King  of  the  Parthians,  encouraged  by 
the  pliability  of  Germanicus,  sent  to  ask  him  to  forbid 


310  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Vonones  to  live  in  Syria,  on  the  ground  that,  as  that 
province  bordered  on  his  Empire,  Vonones  could  easily 
use  it  as  a  base  from  which  to  intrigue  against  him.  In 
view  of  the  fact  that  Vonones  was  in  Syria  as  the  guest 
of  Piso,  the  Parthian  King  was  asking  Germanicus  in 
so  many  words  to  forbid  Piso  to  protect  him.  The 
demand  was,  in  truth,  excessive  and  somewhat  humili- 
ating for  Rome;  but  Germanicus's  entourage  saw  in  this 
demand  a  means  of  humiliating  Piso,  and  worked  and 
talked  to  such  effect  that  Germanicus  conceded  to  it 
and  shut  Vonones  up  in  a  city  in  Cilicia.  A  checkmate 
had  been  inflicted  on  Piso,  but  the  price  of  it  was  a 
humiliation  for  Rome.  Piso  and  his  party  had  good 
reason  for  accusing  Germanicus  and  his  entourage 
of  compromising  with  singular  levity  the  prestige  of 
Rome  in  the  East. 

At  the  end  of  the  year  i8,  then,  the  conflict  between 
Germanicus,  invested  by  a  decree  of  the  Senate  with 
the  general  governorship  of  the  East  and  supported 
by  a  numerous  party  of  Tiberius's  opponents,  and  Piso, 
who,  as  charged  by  Tiberius  with  the  governorship 
of  Syria,  the  m.ost  important  province  in  the  East, 
represented  in  the  East  the  will  of  the  Emperor,  had 
become  so  acute  and  violent  as  to  upset  in  a  most 
dangerous  manner  the  whole  Eastern  policy  of  Rome. 
The  conflict  became  still  more  grave  in  the  following 
year.  At  the  beginning  of  the  year  19,  Germanicus, 
who  was  an  enlightened  young  man,  and  therefore 
desirous  of  travelling  and  seeing  the  famous  spots,  the 


The  Trial  of  Piso  311 

monuments,  and  the  customs  of  various  nations,  made 
with  Agrippina  an  extensive  trip  through  Egypt,  im- 
pelled by  curiosity  to  visit  that  ancient  and  celebrated 
country,  which  even  then  exercised  so  mysterious  a 
fascination  on  the  minds  of  the  peoples  of  the  West. 
While  he  was  on  his  way  to  see  the  Pyramids,  how- 
ever, was  interrogating  the  mysterious  smile  of  the 
Sphinx,  and  was  cleaving  the  sacred  stream  of  the  Nile, 
Piso  profited  by  his  absence  to  avenge  himself  for  the 
checkmate  which  he  had  suffered  the  year  before  on 
Vonones's  account.  Either  on  his  own  initiative,  or,  it 
may  be,  because  he  had  meanw^hile  received  instructions 
from  Tiberius,  Piso  abolished  or  modified  many  of  the 
dispositions  which  Germanicus,  by  virtue  of  his  extra- 
ordinary powders,  had  made  for  Syria,  the  year  before. 
Imagine  the  fury  of  Germanicus,  of  Agrippina,  and  of 
his  friends  and  flatterers,  on  his  return!  Was  this  then 
all  the  deference  Piso  paid  to  the  decrees  of  the  Senate 
and  of  the  authority  conferred  by  them  on  Germanicus? 
Did  Piso  think  himself  lord  of  the  East,  because  he  was 
the  friend  and  representative  of  Tiberius?  On  Ger- 
manicus's  return  there  were  some  violent  altercations 
between  him  and  Piso.  This  time,  Germanicus, 
impelled  by  passion,  by  the  incitements  of  his  flatterers, 
and  also  b}'  the  fear  of  losing  all  authority  in  the  eyes  of 
the  province  if  he  should  yield  once  more,  plucked  up 
courage  to  resort  to  extreme  measures.  In  the  exercise 
of  his  extraordinary  powers,  he  ordered  Piso  to  give  up 
the  governorship  of  the  province  which  Tiberius  had 


312  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

entrusted  to  him.  This  step,  in  view  of  the  fact  that 
Piso  was  the  representative  of  Tiberius,  was  a  bold  one, 
but  it  was  quite  a  legal  one.  In  disobeying  it,  Piso  was 
obliged  to  assume  an  attitude  of  open  defiance  of  the 
laws.  Since  Germanicus  had  dared  to  make  use  of  this 
power,  and  on  this  occasion  showed  that  he  meant 
business  and  was  determined  to  carry  the  matter 
through,  it  was  Piso's  duty  to  give  way  and  obey, 
subject  to  the  right  of  protest  to  Tiberius  and  of 
obtaining  from  him  just  compensation  for  the  affront 
he  had  received. 

Piso  resigned  his  office  and  left  the  province;  and 
travelled  at  an  easy  rate  in  short  stages  towards  Italy. 
When  he  arrived  at  Seleucia,  he  was  overtaken  by  the 
news  that  Germanicus  was  seriously  ill  at  Antioch.  He 
halted,  waiting  for  new  and  more  authentic  news ;  which 
arrived  in  a  fev/  days,  and  announced  to  him  the  young 
man's  death.  What  was  his  illness?  We  do  not  know. 
Untimely  deaths  were  frequent  in  the  family  of 
Augustus.  It  seemed  as  if  many  of  the  younger  mem- 
bers had  not  the  strength  to  stand  the  life  of  drudgery 
and  fatigue  to  which  he  compelled  them,  by  way  of 
preparation  for  the  government  of  the  Empire.  How- 
ever that  may  be,  Piso  no  sooner  knew  that  Germanicus 
was  dead  than  he  returned  to  Syria  with  the  object  of 
re-occupying  the  province.  How  great,  however,  was 
his  surprise  to  learn  that  it  had  been  decided 
amongst  the  friends  of  Germanicus,  after  the  latter's 
death,  to  entrust  the  command  of  the  legions  and  the 


The  Trial  of  Piso  313 

government    of   the   province   to   one   of   themselves, 
Gnaeus  Senzius! 

This  nomination  of  Senzius  was  illegal — there  can  be 
no  doubt  about  that.  With  the  death  of  Germiani- 
cus,  the  extraordinary  power  b}'  which  he  had  moment- 
arily removed  Piso  from  the  province,  himself  assuming 
its  government,  came  to  an  end;  therefore  the  pro- 
vince and  the  command  of  the  armed  forces  re-devolved 
on  Piso.  The  friends  of  Germanicus  had  no  right  or 
power  to  nominate  a  substitute  for  him.  But  for  what 
reason  had  they  arrived  at  so  grave  a  decision?  Ger- 
manicus was  surrounded  in  the  East  by  many  friends, 
many  admirers,  and  many  flatterers,  who  had  placed 
their  hopes  in  him,  as  the  future  emperor.  His  death 
was,  therefore,  a  disaster  for  the  ambitions  and  aspira- 
tions of  many.  On  the  other  hand,  it  had  been  sudden, 
unforeseen,  and  mysterious;  a  fact  which,  in  times  when 
the  causes  and  symptoms  of  illness  were  much  less 
easily  recognised  than  they  are  at  present,  readil}'  lent 
itself  to  the  engendering  of  suspicions,  especially  the 
suspicion  of  poisoning,  then  so  common  and  so  easy. 
Before  the  corpse  of  Germanicus  had  been  burnt, 
Agrippina  and  all  the  entourage  of  the  dead  man's 
intimates  were  persuaded,  and  were  stating  openly, 
that  Germanicus  had  been  poisoned, — and  poisoned  by 
Piso  in  revenge.  Hence  arose  the  necessity  of  their 
preventing  Piso,  even  at  the  cost  of  a  breach  of  the  laws, 
from  re-occupying  his  province,  in  which  they  wished  to 
be  left  supreme,  so  as  to  be  able  to  collect  the  proofs  of 


314  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

the  crime  of  which  Germanicus  was  the  reported 
victim.  For  instance,  they  imprisoned  an  old  woman 
called  Martina,  who  was  said  to  be  an  intimate  friend 
of  Plancina,  a  witch  by  profession.  Her  they  accused 
of  having  supplied  the  poison,  and  of  having  sent  it 
to  Rome. 

When  Piso  first  heard  of  the  accusation,  he  did  not 
take  it  very  seriously,  and  tried  to  force  a  re-entry  into 
the  province  from  which  his  adversaries  were  illegally 
excluding  him.  Perhaps  he  hoped  that  when  he,  the 
legitimate  pro-consul,  presented  himself,  the  opposi- 
tions, which  the  others  pretended  to  be  ready  to  make, 
would  fade  away.  In  this  he  was  disappointed.  Gnseus 
Senzius  resisted,  a  few  insignificant  skirmishes  took 
place,  and  a  civil  war  on  a  small  scale  was  about  to 
begin.  The  prospect,  however,  frightened  both  sides, 
and,  not  wishing  that  so  small  a  matter  of  principle 
should  result  in  a  real  civil  war,  both  parties — Piso,  Sen- 
zius, and  the  friends  of  Germanicus — agreed  to  go  in  a 
body  to  Rome  and  to  submit  the  question  to  the 
Emperor.     And  so  they  did. 

When,  however,  they  arrived,  they  found  Italy  and 
Rome  in  an  incredible  state  of  agitation.  Germanicus 
was  most  popular,  not  only  because  he  was  really 
attractive  to  a  great  many  people,  but  because  every- 
body in  his  admiration  and  sympathy  for  him  vented 
the  discontent  and  repulsion  which  the  rough  character 
and  iron  policy  of  Tiberius  inspired  in  one.  The 
popular  voice  had  gone  so  far  as  to  sa}'  that  Germanicus 


The  Trial  of  Piso  315 

had  made  up  his  mind  to  restore,  when  he  became 
Emperor,  the  republic  of  ancient  times  in  every  detail, 
and  that  Tiberius  on  this  account  suspected  and  hated 
him!  Not  only,  then,  was  his  premature  death  bitterly 
lamented  b}'  everybody;  but  the  explanation  which  his 
friends  gave  of  it — that  Germanicus  had  died  of  poison 
by  the  contrivance  of  Piso — was  immediately  accepted 
as  true,  evident,  and  proved.  Even  at  the  present  day, 
the  masses  are  easily  convinced  of  tales  of  crimes  and 
poisonings.  Imagine  how  it  must  have  been  in  those 
days!  And  the  desire  for  vengeance  followed  hard  on 
the  general  feeling  of  grief  and  horror.  The  wish  was 
expressed  on  all  sides  that  Piso  should  be  given  an 
exemplary  punishment;  it  was  impossible  to  allow  so 
execrable  a  crime  to  go  unpunished.  Would  some 
noble  friend  of  Germanicus,  then,  arise  and  revenge  his 
death?  At  the  same  time,  other  rumours,  no  less 
fantastic,  were  being  whispered  from  ear  to  ear.  No; 
the  trial  would  never  take  place.  Piso  was  secretly 
protected  by  Tiberius,  and  Plancina  by  Livia.  Nobody 
would  dare  attack  them! 

The  arrival  of  Agrippina,  who,  at  the  end  of  19  A.D., 
reached  Brindisi  with  Germanicus's  ashes;  the  trans- 
portation of  the  ashes  to  Rome  in  the  midst  of  the  most 
moving  demonstrations  of  grief  on  the  part  of  the 
Italian  cities;  the  solemn  celebration  of  the  funeral  rites 
in  Rome,  made  the  situation  still  more  serious.  Public 
exasperation  increased,  not  only  against  Piso,  but  also 
against  Tiberius.     Tiberius  and   Livia  had  not  taken 


3i6  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

part  in  the  funeral  ceremonies  for  Germanicus  at  Rome ; 
the  latter  because  she  was  too  old  and  infirm,  the  former 
because  he  had  avoided  recently  as  much  as  possible 
investing  family  ceremonies  with  superfluous  official 
importance.  The  public,  however,  began  to  accuse 
these  two  of  not  being  at  all  displeased  at  the  death  of 
Germanicus.  Of  course,  that  young  man  had  always 
given  umbrage  to  Tiberius.  Had  not  the  latter  recalled 
him  from  Germany,  so  that  he  should  not  cover  himself 
with  too  much  glory? 

It  was  not  long  before  even  graver  charges  began  to  be 
whispered  about.  Piso  had  arrived  at  Rome  by  way  of 
the  Tiber,  disembarking  near  the  Tomb  of  the  Cassars, 
the  resting-place  of  the  ashes  of  his  victim,  and  with  a 
large  retinue  of  friends  had  made  an  ostentatious 
progress  to  his  house  above  the  Forum,  where  he  had 
given  a  great  banquet.  It  was  clear,  then,  that  he  had 
no  fears.  He  defied  public  opinion  and  the  Courts. 
And  his  attitude  was  justified,  for  he  had  acted  on  tne 
orders  of  Tiberius,  and  possessed  a  letter  from  him  in 
which  these  orders  were  given.  That  letter  was  his 
shield  of  defence  against  every  danger!  In  point  of 
fact,  public  suspicion  was  by  now  being  diverted  from 
Piso  against  a  higher  target.  It  was  being  directed 
straight  against  Tiberius  and  Li  via.  And  Agrippina, 
whom  grief  was  robbing  of  the  little  sense  which  nature 
had  given  her,  added  fuel  to  the  enmities  and  sus- 
picions in  the  public  and  the  Senate  through  her 
lamentations,  her  recriminations,  and  her  accusations. 


The  Trial  of  Piso  317 

which  were  as  vehement  as  they  were  unfounded. 
When  at  last,  therefore,  certain  persons, — Fulcinius 
Trio,  VitelHus,  and  Veranius, — incited  by  pubHc  opin- 
ion, by  the  friends  of  Germanicus,  who  cried  for  ven- 
geance, and  by  Agrippina,  who  would  hear  of  no  mercy, 
decided  to  accuse  Piso  and  Plancina  of  poison,  as  well  as 
Piso  and  his  son  Marcius  of  having  tried  to  stir  up  civil 
war,  Tiberius  found  himself  in  a  most  grave  dilemma. 
It  seems  that  trials  such  as  these,  involving  persons  of 
the  highest  rank  and  acts  of  a  political  character,  could 
not  be  set  in  motion  without  the  approval  of  the 
Emperor,  who  had  the  additional  privilege  of  deciding 
whether  the  case  should  come  before  the  ordinary  tri- 
bunal,— the  jury,  as  in  trials  of  Verres  and  Clodius, — or 
whether  he  ought  to  entrust  it  instead  to  the  Senate. 
Tiberius  did  not  believe  in  the  imputation  of  poison, 
which  was  the  only  really  grave  charge  brought  against 
Piso, — the  other  charge,  that  of  civil  war,  being  more 
in  the  nature  of  a  second  string.  He  did  not  believe  in 
the  poison  charge,  just  as  no  sensible  and  impartial 
man  believed  in  it,  just  as  Tacitus,  years  later,  did  not 
believe  in  it,  even  though,  with  his  usual  malice,  he  has 
done  all  he  could  to  induce  posterity  to  accept  it  as 
true.  Tiberius  did  not  believe  in  it,  for  not  only  was 
there  no  proof  of  the  charge  itself,  but  it  was  in  itself 
absurd.  In  fact,  the  accusers,  when  forced  to  explain 
when  and  in  what  way  Piso  had  poisoned  Germanicus, 
had  found  themselves  reduced  to  asserting  that,  at  a 
banquet  to  which  Germanicus  had  invited  Piso,  and  at 


31 8  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

which  Piso  was  seated  at  a  considerable  distance  from 
Germanicus,  Piso,  at  a  moment  when  Germanicus  was 
looking  in  another  direction,  had  poured  the  poison  into 
his  wine,  actually  in  the  midst  of  his  host's  numerous 
servants  and  in  the  presence  of  the  guests !  This  story 
may  be  taken  as  a  sample  of  the  whole  accusation. 
Tiberius  then  knew  that  the  charge  was  a  romance, 
created  and  magnified  by  the  political  and  partisan 
enmities  which  amongst  the  Roman  nobility  were  so 
violent,  by  the  credulity  of  the  public,  by  the  unreason- 
ing hatred  the  people  felt  towards  himself  and  the 
supreme  authority  with  which  he  had  been  invested. 
He  would,  therefore,  gladly  have  cut  the  trial  short  at 
the  very  beginning. 

Could  he  do  so,  however?  This  Emperor,  whom  so 
many  inexperienced  historians  have  represented  as  a 
terrible  despot,  was  in  reality  possessed  of  much  less 
power  as  head  of  the  State  than  his  present-day  detract- 
ors suppose.  He  was  obliged  to  take  into  account 
public  opinion,  however  obtuse  and  mad  it  might  be. 
He  was  vaguely  suspected  of  having  prompted  Piso 
to  poison  Germanicus,  or  at  least  of  having  willingly 
shut  his  eyes  to  the  crime.  If  he  prevented  the  charge 
being  brought,  would  not  this  be  the  strongest  con- 
firmation of  this  mad  calumny?  Would  not  the  whole 
populace  murmur  in  their  anger  that  the  unfortunate 
Germanicus  had  been  robbed,  first  of  life,  and  then  of 
vengeance, — and  by  the  man  who  was  his  adoptive 
father?     This,  in  the  eyes  of  the  ancients,  constituted 


The  Trial  of  Piso  319 

the  gravest  dereliction  of  family  obligations.  The  trial 
was  a  satisfaction  which  the  public  demanded;  and 
the  Emperor — that  pretended  despot,  lord  of  the  whole 
State — had  not  power  enough  to  refuse  it. 

So  Tiberius  was  forced  to  consent  to  the  trial.  Being, 
however,  a  wise  and  level-headed  man,  he  remitted  it 
to  the  Senate,  the  one  of  the  two  tribunals  which  might 
be  expected  with  greater  reason  to  be  enlightened  and 
serene.  The  other — the  qucesHo,  or,  as  we  should  say, 
the  jury — was  too  closely  in  contact  with  public 
opinion,  and  not  likely  to  be  able  to  exercise  calm 
judgment  in  a  case  in  which  public  opinion  was  so 
much  excited  and  prejudiced  against  the  principal 
defendant.  The  Senate,  on  the  contrary,  was  the 
gravest  body  in  the  Republic,  and  might  be  expected 
to  rise  superior  to  popular  passions  in  the  exercise  of  its 
judicial  functions.  Nevertheless,  even  in  the  Senate, 
the  friends  of  Germanicus  and  the  enemies  of  Tiberius 
were  to  be  found  in  force.  Not  only  this,  but  a  fierce 
antipathy  divided  the  ancient  from  the  new  nobility. 
During  the  fifty  years  which  followed  the  end  of  the 
civil  wars,  many  recently  ennobled  families  had  entered 
the  Senate.  Amongst  these,  the  families  of  ancient 
nobility,  those  whose  glory  dated  back  to  the  grand  era 
of  the  Republic,  at  this  time  formed  only  a  small  yet 
haughty  minority,  which  lived  apart,  despised  the  new 
nobility,  and  kept  aloof  as  far  as  possible.  Now  Piso 
belonged  to  one  of  these  ancient  families,  and  to  one  of 
the  most  glorious  of  them.     The  constitution  of  the 


320  Ancient  Rome  and  ^lodern  America 

Senate  as  the  tribunal,  meant,  therefore,  entrusting 
the  decision  of  the  case  to  the  new,  upstart  nobility, 
which  was  full  of  blind  rancour  against  the  haughtiness 
of  the  old  families. 

In  any  case  there  was  no  other  tribunal ;  and  between 
the  two  evils,  Tiberius  could  only  choose  the  lesser. 
However,  he  realised  so  clearly  the  gravity  of  the 
dangers  which  surrounded  the  course  of  justice,  in  the 
midst  of  so  many  frenzied  passions,  in  this  trial  which 
had  been  engineered  by  insensate  hatreds  and  rancours, 
that  when,  as  president  of  the  Senate,  he  had  to  open 
the  sessions,  he  made  a  speech,  the  gist  of  which  Tacitus 
has  preserved  for  us.  Whoever  reads  it  cannot  help 
recognising  the  spirit  of  profound  wisdom  and  equity 
which  inspires  it.  Tiberius  explained  quite  clearliT"  to 
the  Senate  that  the  charge  of  poisoning  levelled  against 
Piso,  if  true,  would  be  an  extremely  serious  matter. 
He  reminded  them,  however,  that  Piso  was  a  prominent 
man,  who  had  rendered  eminent  services  to  the  Repub- 
lic and  belonged  to  one  of  the  most  ancient  and  noble 
families  in  Rome.  They  must,  therefore,  bring  the 
most  serene  impartiality  to  bear  on  their  judgment, 
forgetting  who  was  the  accused,  if  they  found  him 
guilty,  forgetting  who  was  the  victim,  if  they  found  him 
innocent.  However  great  his  affection  for  Germanicus 
might  be,  nothing  would  induce  him  to  wish  for  the 
sacrifice  on  the  latter's  tomb,  of  an  innocent  man,  for 
the  satisfaction  of  the  insensate  mania  for  revenge 
which  had  taken  possession  of  the  public. 


The  Trial  of  Piso  321 

The  speech  was  a  wise  and  humane  one;  but  what 
could  sober  words,  even  from  an  Emperor's  mouth, 
avail  when  passions  are  aroused?  The  Senate  allotted 
two  days  to  the  prosecution,  three  to  the  defence. 
There  was  to  be  an  interval  of  six  days  between  the 
two  sections  of  the  trial.  For  two  whole  days,  the 
accusers  talked,  reconstructing,  as  Cicero  had  done 
in  Verres's  case,  the  whole  history  of  Piso's  life.  They 
went  so  far  as  to  accuse  him  of  having  misgoverned  the 
previous  provinces  he  had  had ;  they  went  minutely  into 
the  history  of  his  government  in  Syria,  and  repeated 
the  fantastic  story  of  the  poisoning.  Tacitus  himself 
recognised  that  the  charges  were  very  weak,  especially 
the  accusation  of  poisoning,  which  was  the  only  serious 
one.  Accordingly,  the  first  imipression  made  by  the  trial 
was  very  uncertain.  The  public  was  prejudiced  in 
favour  of  the  prosecution;  in  the  Senate  there  was  a 
strong  party  hostile  to  Fiso.  After  all,  however,  the 
Senate  was  a  great  political  body,  and  many  of  its 
members  could  not  but  recognise  that  the  charges  v/ere 
slender  ones.  Ever^^body  felt  that  the  issue  depended 
on  Tiberius,  who  could,  according  as  he  showed  himself 
favourable  or  the  reverse,  weigh  down  the  scales  on  the 
side  of  acquittal  or  of  conviction.  Everybody,  there- 
fore, looked  towards  him,  with  hope  or  with  anxiety. 
But  Tiberius  listened  to  the  prosecution  without  moving 
an  eyelid,  as  impassive  as  a  statue,  without  allowing  a 
glimpse  into  his  secret  thoughts  on  the  subject.  Could 
he  act  otherwise?     If  he  had  shown  himself  favourable 


322  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

to  Piso,  he  would  have  been  accused  of  shielding  the 
murderers  of  Germanicus,  through  hatred  of  his  adopted 
son  or  even  through  actual  complicity  in  the  crime. 
He  could  not  and  would  not  attach  himself,  however,  to 
the  mob  which  cried  for  Piso's  head,  innocent  or  guilty. 
He  was  too  haughty  and  too  serious  a  man  to  descend  to 
such  baseness.  Recognise  that  public  opinion  was  a 
force  of  which  account  must  be  taken, — this  he  wa,s 
prepared  to  do;  pander  to  it  like  a  slave,  at  the  cost  of 
honour  and  justice, — no. 

Rarely  had  a  Roman  Emperor  found  himself  placed, 
by  the  suspicions  of  the  public,  by  the  mad  passions  of 
the  people,  by  the  perfidious  malevolence  of  the  cabals 
and  coteries,  in  a  more  difficult  position.  The  six  days 
that  elapsed  between  the  prosecution  and  the  defence 
must  have  been  thorny  days  for  Tiberius.  Inasmuch 
as  a  nod  from  him  could  weigh  down  the  scales,  both 
parties  tried  to  influence  him.  Piso  and  his  friends 
worked  to  induce  him  and  Livia  to  make  up  their  minds 
to  intervene  openly  in  the  Senate  on  behalf  of  outraged 
innocence.  The  other  side  endeavoured  to  frighten 
him.  They  accused  Tiberius  sotto  voce  of  having 
favoured  Piso  unjustly  in  his  speech  to  the  Senate,  in 
which  he  had  already  assumed  the  charge  of  poisoning 
to  be  untrue.  They  circulated  the  story  of  the  com- 
promising letter  in  Piso's  possession  which  the  latter 
threatened  to  read  in  the  Senate,  if  Tiberius  did  not 
help  him.  Meanwhile  Agrippina  was  filling  Rome 
with    her    lamentations    and    imprecations,    and    the 


The  Trial  of  Piso  323 

public  agitation  was  increasing.  Cries  were  heard  on 
every  side  that  Germanicus  must  be  avenged.  Piso's 
position  was  tragic.  But  Tiberius  would  not  depart 
from  the  line  of  conduct,  that  of  impartiality,  which 
he  had  marked  out  for  himself — hoping,  perhaps,  that 
the  trial  would  furnish  him  sooner  or  later  with  an 
opportunity  of  preserving  justice  without  laying  himself 
open  to  suspicions  of  too  debasing  a  nature.  He 
allowed  Livia,  however,  to  interest  herself  openly  in 
behalf  of  Plancina  against  whom  also  charges  were 
levelled;  and  Livia's  intervention  might  be  indirectly 
of  service  to  Piso,  as  it  made  it  clear,  to  those  who  cared 
to  see,  that  Germanicus' s  own  grandmother  did  not 
believe  in  the  charge  of  poisoning. 

Piso  was  an  energetic  man.  Confident  in  the  justice 
of  his  case,  he  reappeared  in  the  Senate  when,  after 
the  lapse  of  six  days,  the  sessions  again  began;  and 
defended  himself  in  a  clever,  energetic,  and  resolute 
speech.  He  seems  to  have  been  especially  happy  in  the 
way  in  which  he  shattered  the  charge  of  poisoning. 
He  demanded  that  his  own  slaves,  and  those  belonging 
to  Germanicus  who  had  been  present  at  the  famous 
brmquet  at  which  it  was  suggested  that  he  had  put 
poison  in  the  dead  man's  wine,  should  be  put  to  the 
torture.  The  speech  made  a  lively  impression,  and 
would  probably  have  saved  Piso,  had  not  serious  dis- 
orders broken  out  in  Rome  while  he  was  speaking  in  the 
Senate.  An  immense  popular  demonstration  invaded 
the  precincts  of  the  Senate,   while  he  was  speaking, 


324  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

howling  for  his  execution,  and  crying  that,  if  the  Senate 
acquitted  him,  they  had  serious  thoughts  of  avenging 
Germanicus  by  lynching  the  judges.  A  section  burst 
into  the  Forum,  overturned  the  statues,  and  made  as  if 
to  drag  them  away  to  the  Gemoniae  and  to  break  them 
in  pieces.  It  was  found  necessary  to  send  Piso  to  his 
house  with  an  escort  of  soldiers,  in  order  to  save  him 
from  violence. 

What  was  the  origin  of  these  demonstrations?  Were 
they  the  natural  explosion  of  popular  passion,  fed  by  the 
ready  credulity  of  the  masses?  Were  they  stirred  up  by 
the  enemies  of  Tiberius  and  Piso,  to  impress  the  hesi- 
tating section  of  the  Senate?  We  shall  never  know. 
All  that  is  certain  is  that,  by  the  evening  of  the  day  on 
which  these  demonstrations  took  place,  nobody  in  Rome, 
least  of  all  the  accused,  was  any  longer  under  the  delu- 
sion that  Piso  could  be  acquitted  of  the  charge,  however 
absurd  and  unjust  it  might  be.  The  Senate,  weakened  by 
so  many  internal  dissensions  and  by  so  many  civil  wars, 
was  no  longer  a  strong  enough  assembly  to  dare  resist 
this  mad  fury  on  the  part  of  the  masses.  By  evening, 
Piso  had  lost  all  heart  and  had  already  made  up  his 
mind  to  give  up  the  struggle.  But  his  sons  gathered 
round  him  and  put  into  him  fresh  courage.  Renewed 
efforts  were  made  to  induce  Tiberius  to  oppose  his 
authority  to  the  torrent  of  calumny  and  insensate  hate. 
Had  Tiberius  left  room  for  one  glimmer  of  light?  or  did 
Piso's  sons  and  friends  delude  themselves  and  delude 
him?     It  is  certain  that  next  day  Piso  again  plucked  up 


The  Trial  of  Piso  325 

courage  and  returned  to  the  Senate,  where  he  continued 
his  defence,  parrying  and  countering  fresh  attacks, 
vnth  his  eyes  ever  fixed  on  Tiberius,  the  man  v/ho  more 
than  anyone  else  was  persuaded  of  his  innocence,  and 
from  whom  a  word  might  be  so  useful  to  him.  Tiberius, 
however,  did  not  dare  pronounce  that  word.  Sur- 
rounded as  he  was  by  so  many  enemies  and  suspicions, 
not  even  he — the  lord  of  the  world,  as  the  historians 
call  him — felt  himself  strong  enough  to  engage  in  open 
duel  with  the  public  opinion  of  Rome  and  the  majority 
in  the  Senate.  So,  when  he  perceived  that  Tiberius 
himself  could  not  or  would  not  help  him,  Piso  aban- 
doned the  struggle.  Returning  home  that  evening, 
he  anticipated  his  certain  conviction  by  committing 
suicide  during  the  night. 

The  public  had  gained  their  victim,  to  comfort  them 
in  their  grief  for  the  premature  loss  of  Germanicus. 
The  enemies  of  Piso  were,  however,  not  content,  and 
proposed  that  the  name  of  Piso  be  erased  from  the 
fasti,  and  that  the  half  of  his  goods  be  confiscated;  that 
his  son  Marcus  be  imprisoned  for  ten  years,  only 
Plancina,  out  of  regard  for  Livia,  being  allowed  to  go 
unpunished.  But  Tiberius  judged  that  the  blood  of 
Piso  was  expiation  enough  for  a  crime  which  nobody 
had  committed;  and,  since  the  public  had  had  their 
bloody  satisfaction,  he  intervened  openly,  and,  by 
virtue  of  his  authority,  prevented  the  erasure  of  Piso's 
name  from  the  fasti,  as  well  as  the  confiscation  of  his 
goods  and  the  condemnation  of  his  son. 


326  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

The  trial  of  Piso  was  one  of  the  most  savage  of  all  the 
judicial  dramas  in  Roman  history.  The  trial  of  Clodius 
had  been  a  comedy,  that  of  Verres  a  tragi-comedy,  that 
of  Piso  was  pure  tragedy  and  terrible  tragedy.  For  it 
was  an  episode  in  the  gradual  extermination  of  the  old 
and  glorious  Roman  nobility,  which  was  being  brought 
about  by  the  new  social  forces  which,  during  the  years 
of  peace,  had  grown  up  under  the  shadow  of  the  imperial 
authority.  How  sad  a  spectacle  are  these  trials  which 
from  time  to  time  recur  in  history!  The  penal  law 
ought  to  be  the  sacred  instrument  of  justice,  which 
punishes  the  wrong-doers,  and  defends  and  comforts  the 
good  citizens.  The  world  is,  however,  full  of  wicked 
passions;  and  wicked  passions  find  fertile  soil  in  political 
parties,  social  classes,  and  public  opinion — that  vague 
power  which  has  come  so  much  to  the  fore  in  the  last 
hundred  years.  These  evil  passions,  from  time  to  time, 
seize  hold  of  the  instruments  of  justice,  and  convert 
them  into  instruments  of  torment  and  persecution  for 
the  torture,  the  defamation,  and  the  extermination  of 
the  innocent,  for  whom  there  is  no  way  of  escape,  no 
refuge,  and  no  pity. 

These  trials  prove  one  thing, — a  truth  which  perhaps 
the  modern  world,  in  which  the  power  of  public  opinion 
has  increased  so  much,  ought  always  to  bear  in  mind. 
And  that  is,  that  the  stronger  public  opinion  is  in  a 
state,  the  more  necessary  it  is  for  that  state  to  have  an 
unperturbed,  independent,  enlightened  judicature, 
armed  with  a  vigorous  and  clear  doctrine  of  justice. 


The  Trial  of  Piso  327 

backed  by  a  powerful  government,  which  can  hold  Its 
own  against  the  most  A'iolent  gusts  of  public  opinion, 
and  execute  real  justice  in  the  teeth  of  the  crooked 
malevolence  of  the  masses.  Otherwise  justice  can  only 
too  easily  degenerate  into  a  kind  of  tragic  farce. 


Part  V 
The  Limit  of  Sport 


329 


THE  LIMIT  OF  SPORT  ' 

""Aptaxov  uSwp,"  says  Pindar.  "Water  is  good,"  as 
it  is  often  translated.  But  why  should  a  hymn  in 
honour  of  a  victor  in  the  games  begin  with  a  senti- 
ment which  would  be  much  better  suited  to  an  anti- 
alcoholic  league?  uowp  here  does  not  mean  water; 
it  is  the  corresponding  word  to  the  Latin  sudor,  which 
means  sweat, — the  symbol  of  the  physical  effort  made 
by  the  athlete.  "Excellent  is  sweat,"  that  is  to  say, 
the  effort  made  by  the  victor  in  training  himself  and  in 
winning  an  arduous  victory. 

"Apta-rov  jcwp,  then,  says  the  clarion  voice  of  one  of  the 
noblest  sons  of  Greece,  the  great  poet  who,  in  honour 
of  the  sport  of  his  times,  has  clothed  in  lyric  poetry  the 
dazzling  myths  of  Hellenic  polytheism.  The  motto 
has  travelled  down  the  ages,  and  we,  too,  are  assembled 
here  to  interpret  it  after  the  fashion  of  our  times.  Is 
it  not  inevitable  that  the  speech  I  have  to  make  should 
be  merely  a  development  of  this  undying  theme, 
ap'.jTov  ucwp?  And  yet  3^ou  would  be  justified  in 
asking  why  this  task  should  devolve  on  this  occasion 

'  Speech  delivered  at  the  opcninj:^  of  the  Congress  of  the  Psychology 
of  Sport  at  Lausanne,  May  6,  191 3. 

331 


332    Ancient  R.ome  and  Modern  America 

upon  a  man  who  spends  his  whole  hfe  in  plying  a  tool — 
the  pen — which  is  too  light  to  convince  him  of  the 
truth  of  Pindar's  apothegm.  It  is  true  that  there  was  a 
time  when  he  who  has  the  honour  of  addressing  you  was 
not  yet  an  examiner  of  historical  documents  nor  a 
student  of  philosophical  problems ;  when  he  was,  on  the 
contrary,  an  ardent  gymnast.  I  will  even  confess  to 
you  that  the  first  time  his  name  appeared  in  the  news- 
papers, it  was  in  the  accounts  of  gymnastic  and  athletic 
meetings,  in  connection  with  which  some  amiable  re- 
porters thought  it  proper  to  comment  on  his  squirrel- 
like agility.  But  those  times  are,  alas!  long  past. 
The  over-violent  passion  for  physical  exercises  which 
was  his  between  the  ages  of  ten  and  fifteen  years  obliged 
him  suddenly  to  drop  them.  He  has  allowed  his 
muscles  gradually  to  be  invaded  and  eaten  up  by  that 
physical  laziness  which  enervates  so  many  thinkers 
of  the  present  day,  and  which  upsets  the  balance  of 
their    bodily    forces. 

You  see,  then,  that  these  far-distant  memories 
cannot  give  me  authority  to  claim  a  right,  however 
small,  to  address  you  on.  this  occasion.  I  .am  a  stranger 
in  this  world  of  sport,  which  has  developed  so  rapidly 
in  the  last  thirty  years.  I  have  followed  only  at  a 
distance  the  movement  which  has  given  it  birth,  and  I 
should  find  myself  in  great  difficulties  if  I  had  to 
discuss  in  its  details  one  of  the  numberless  questions 
attaching  to  this  form  of  contemporary  activity. 
What  authority,  then,  have  I  for  addressing  you  on  this 


The  Limit  of  Sport  333 

occasion?  None,  And  the  kindness  which  Baron  de 
Coubertin  has  shown  in  honouring  me  with  an  invita- 
tion to  address  you,  though  most  flattering  to  me,  can- 
not fill  the  void  left  by  manifest  incompetence  for  the 
task.  You  will  tell  me  that  I  should  have  done  better 
to  remember  the  wise  advice  Homer  gave  the  cobbler, 
and  to  refuse  this  honour  of  which  I  was  not  worthy. 
And  you  will  be  right.  But  I  would  excuse  myself  by 
telling  you  first  of  all  that  it  is  difficult  to  refuse  any- 
thing to  so  distinguished  and  amiable  a  man  and  to  so 
ardent  an  advocate  of  the  causes  he  makes  his  own  as 
M.  de  Coubertin.  Secondly,  if  I  am  a  sportsman  who 
long  ago  has  made  his  final  exit,  I  am  also  a  man  who 
tries,  as  far  as  his  feeble  wits  will  allow  him,  to  under- 
stand that  life  outside  himself  in  which  he  can  take  no 
immediate  and  direct  part. 

Is  not  that  the  role,  and  in  a  certain  sense  the  obses- 
sion, of  the  historian?  The  historian  must  understand 
all  the  forms  and  phenomena  of  life;  crimes,  intrigues, 
battles,  wars,  revolutions,  loves,  hatreds,  perfidies, 
the  hidden  weaknesses  of  great  men,  the  blind  impulses 
of  the  masses,  the  noblest  and  the  basest  sentiments 
which  actuate  the  human  mind.  If  we  were  required 
to  have  experienced  everything  that  we  are  required  to 
understand,  the  profession  of  historian  would  be 
the  most  difficult  and  the  most  dangerous  in  the 
world;  for,  in  order  to  qualify,  a  man  would  have  at 
least  to  run  the  risk  of  the  galleys  or  of  the 
scaffold.     Without  a  doubt,  this  necessity   of  under- 


334  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

standing  all  the  forms  of  the  life  outside  is  also  one  of 
the  great  weaknesses  of  historians.  Often  they  make 
mistakes;  even  more  often,  the  picture  they  give  of 
things  seems  but  pale  by  contrast  with  the  living  reality, 
to  those  who  have  actually  lived  that  reality.  I  am 
quite  sure  that  this  will  be  my  fate,  if  I  talk  to  you  about 
things  which  you  know  better  than  do  I.  That,  how- 
ever, is  the  inevitable  drawback  of  the  profession,  and 
I  shall  go  through  with  my  task,  relying  on  your  kind 
indulgence. 

I  shall  talk  to  you,  then,  about  sport  in  modern  life 
as  a  man  who  has  considered  it  from  outside.  I  shall 
philosophise  awhile  about  sport,  if  you  will  allow  me; 
for  to  philosophise  about  a  thing  is  often  a  polite  way 
of  talking  about  a  thing  regarding  which  the  speaker 
has  little  knowledge  to  people  whose  knowledge  regard- 
ing it  is  considerable.  And  I  will  ask  myself  this 
question :  What  is  and  what  ought  to  be  the  function 
of  sport  in  modern  society?  What  is  its  role,  and  what 
are  its  limits?  Put  thus,  the  question  is  but  a  par- 
ticular form  of  a  more  general  question  which  philo- 
sophers have  long  been  asking  themselves :  What  is  the 
mutual  and  reciprocal  role  of  the  different  human 
activities?  It  is  a  well-known  truth  that  with  the 
advances  of  civilisation  social  life  undergoes  an  inward 
process  of  differentiation.  Commerce  separates  from 
industry,  industry  from  war,  war  from  government, 
government  from  the  intellectual  activities,  which  in 
their  turn  become  specialised, — art,  science,   religion, 


The  Limit  of  Sport  335 

etc.  We  get  professions,  corporations,  institutions,  and 
classes  corresponding  to  all  these  different  activities; 
men,  that  is  to  say,  who  have  passions,  ambitions, 
desires,  needs,  and  interests,  and  who  quickly  come  into 
conflict  with  one  another.  What  parts  ought  to  be 
allowed  to  all  these  different  activities?  Which  is 
the  most  necessary,  the  most  noble,  and  the  most 
exalted?  Which  ought  to  be  surrounded  with  the 
greatest  respect,  covered  with  the  greatest  honours, 
and  recompensed  with  the  most  considerable  rewards? 

oMen  have  answered  this  question  in  countless  differ- 
ent ways.  It  is,  however,  easy  to  discover  in  many  of 
these  answers  a  common  tendency  that  is  a  proneness 
to  consider  as  first  and  all-important  the  corporation, 
profession,  or  institution  to  which  each  inquirer  belongs. 
A  savant  is  easily  convinced  that  the  end  of  life  is  the 
search  after  the  truth.  In  his  eyes,  the  universe  must 
exist  only  in  order  that  men  of  science  may  discover  its 
laws  and  its  secrets.  For  artists,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  world  has  been  created  to  enable  them  to  adorn  it 
with  pictures,  statues,  or  buildings.  For  the  soldier 
war  is  the  end  of  existence,  while  the  merchant  sees  in 
commerce  the  beneficent  force  which  makes  the  world 
go  round.  And  so  on.  All  these  theories  seem  sober 
fact  to  those  who  formulate  them;  unfortunately  the 
others,  those  who  belong  to  a  different  class  or  pro- 
fession,  reject  them  as  absurd  and  ridiculous  errors. 

How  are  the  various  views  to  be  reconciled?  A  cer- 
tain number  of  philosophers  have  tried  to  raise  them- 


336  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

selves  above  these  too  narrow  or  too  biassed  points  of 
view,  and  to  find  solutions  of  general  value.  INI  any 
have  been  proposed ;  now  is  not  the  time  to  discuss  the 
principal  ones.  So  I  will  confine  myself  to  expounding 
to  you  that  one  of  these  theories  which  seems  to  me 
the  simplest,  the  most  ingenious,  and  the  most  useful 
for  the  resolution  of  the  problem  which  we  have  set 
ourselves  in  connection  with  sport.  It  is  the  theory 
of  the  limits.  All  human  activities  ought  to  be 
reciprocal  limits. 

Take  art  and  morality  for  instance:  What  relation 
ought  they  to  bear  to  each  other?  The  question  has 
been  discussed  with  ardour.  x\rtists,  and  many  of 
their  friends,  have  tried  to  postulate  a  violent  schism 
between  the  two,  proclaiming  that  art  has  the  right  to 
search  for  beauty  wherever  she  can  find  it,  without 
bothering  herself  about  morality.  Super-moralists,  on 
the  contrary,  have  tried  to  make  art  the  slave  of 
morality,  asserting  that  the  former  ought  to  be  always 
ready  to  obey  its  orders  and  to  sacrifice  herself  to  its 
demands.  But  would  it  not  be  more  reasonable  and 
more  human  to  say  that  art  and  morality  are  reciprocal 
limits?  Morality  is  one  of  art's  limits;  without  wishing 
to  make  her  its  slave,  it  can  and  must  prevent  her  from 
seeking  beauty  in  certain  subjects  and  certain  incidents 
which  would  be  dangerous  to  morals  or  to  the  pure- 
mindcdncss  of  the  public.  The  forms  of  beauty  are  so 
numerous.  Why  should  not  art  refrain  for  moral  reasons 
from  seeking  for  some  of  them?     But  art  on  her  side 


The  Limit  of  Sport  337 

is  a  limit  of  morality;  she  is  in  no  way  anxious  to  domi- 
nate it,  but  she  can  and  must  prevent  morality  from 
going  astray  in  its  search  for  perfection.  Those  who 
are  familiar  with  history  know  that  a  spice  of  ar- 
tistic taste  has  always  been  the  best  remedy  for  the 
most  dangerous  or  the  most  repugnant  excesses  of 
asceticism. 

Let  us  take  another  example.  A  question  which  has 
much  exercised  men's  minds  is  whether  art  and  science 
ought  to  set  before  themselves  practical  ends,  or  whether 
they  are  in  themselves  ends.  There  are  people  who 
would  like  to  subordinate  the  rest  of  the  world  to  art 
and  to  science.  This  entails  requiring  of  art  and 
science  that  they  should  seek  beauty  and  truth  without 
having  in  view  any  utilitarian  end,  without  troubling 
themselves  to  ask  whether  they  are  useful  or  hurtful  to 
man.  Others  again  propose  to  subordinate  art  and 
science  to  the  rest  of  the  world,  asserting  that  every 
art  and  every  science  which  does  not  serve  practical 
ends  is  a  waste  of  time  and  trouble.  Here,  too,  it 
seems  to  mic  that  it  would  be  more  human  to  say  that 
science  and  art  seek  truth  and  beauty,  not  utility. 
Utility,  then,  is  not  the  end  of  art  and  of  science; 
but  it  is  one  of  their  limits.  The  truths  which  the 
human  mind  can  discover,  like  the  forms  of  beauty 
which  it  can  create,  are  infinite. 

Is  it  strange,  then,  that  man,  unable  to  discover  all 
the  truths  or  to  create  all  the  forms  of  beauty,  should 
choose  for  pref(;rence  those  which,  in  addition  to  con- 


33^  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

f erring  intellectual  or  aesthetic  pleasure,  help  him  to 
live?  Can  anyone  see  anything  absurd  in  this?  If  a 
man  set  to  work  to  build  edifices  with  the  sole  object  of 
pleasing  the  eye  through  harmonious  lines,  he  could 
build  them  as  fancy  prompted  him;  there  would  be  no 
limit  either  to  the  variety  of  forms  or  to  the  number  of 
different  constructions.  Will  anybody  be  found  to 
maintain  that  art  has  the  right  to  fill  the  world  with 
beautiful  edifices  which  are  of  no  use  for  anything? 
No,  practical  considerations  have  their  claim.  Even 
the  epochs  in  which  architecture  flourished  most  bravely 
built  edifices  which,  while  beautiful  to  look  at,  served 
also  definite  ends;  and  nobody  has  ever  protested 
against  the  limitations  which  this  practical  considera- 
tion imposed. 

Similarly  sport  must,  in  my  opinion,  be  considered 
as  a  limit;  the  limit  necessary  to  the  excesses  of  an 
intellectual  and  sedentary  civilisation,  which  exposes 
the  nervous  system  to  formidable  trials.  M.  de  Couber- 
tin  has  analysed  this  aspect  of  modern  life  so  well  in  his 
Essais  de  psychologic  sportive,  that  I  beg  leave  to  quote 
one  of  the  numerous  fine  passages  from  that  book: 

La  vie  moderne  n'est  plus  ni  locale  ni  speciale;  tout  y 
influe  sur  tout.  D'une  part  la  rapidite  et  la  multiplicity 
dcs  transports  ont  fait  de  riiomme  un  etre  essentiellement 
mobile,  pour  le  quel  les  distances  sont  de  plus  en  plus  insigni- 
fiantes  a  franchir  et  sollicitent,  par  consequent,  de  frequents 
chani^ements  de  lieu;  d'autrc  part  I'egalisation  des  points 
de  depart  et  la  possibilite  d'elevations  rapides  vers  le  pou- 


The  Limit  of  Sport  339 

voir  et  la  fortune  ont  excite  les  appetits  et  les  ambitions 
des  masses  a  un  point  inconnu  jusqu'  ici.  ...  Ce  double 
element  a  transforme  dc  fagon  fondamentale  I'effort 
humain.  L'eflort  d'autre-fois  etait  regulicr  et  constant;  une 
certaine  securitc  resultant  de  la  stabiliie  sociale,  le  pro- 
tegeait.  Surtout,  il  n  etait  pas  cerebral  a  un  dcgre  cxcessif. 
Celui  d'aujourd'hui  est  tout  autre.  L'inquietude  et 
I'esperance  I'environnent  avec  une  intensite  particuliere. 
C'est  que  I'echec  et  la  reussite  ont  dc  nos  jours  des  con- 
sequences 6normes.  L'homme  peut  a  la  fois  tout  craindre 
et  tout  esperer.  Dc  cet  etat  de  chose  est  nee  une  agitation 
que  les  transformations  de  la  vie  extericure  encouragent  et 
accroissent.  Au  dedans  et  an  dehors  le  cerveau  est  entre- 
tenu  dans  une  sorte  d'cbullition  incessante.  Les  points  de 
vue,  les  aspects  des  choses,  les  combinaisons,  les  possibilites, 
tant  pour  les  individus  que  pour  les  collectivites,  se  succedent 
si  rapidement  qu'il  faut  pour  en  tenir  compte  et  les  uti- 
lises au  besoin  se  tenir  toujours  en  evcil  et  comme  en  une 
mobilisation  permanente. 

This  picture  of  modern  life  is  perfect.  Never  has 
man  lived  in  such  a  state  of  permanent  and  growing 
excitement.  If  the  men  of  the  ancient  world  could 
come  to  life  again,  their  first  impression,  you  may  be 
sure,  would  be  that  mankind  had  gone  mad.  It  is  this 
excitement  which  has  produced  the  formidable  explo- 
sion of  energy  that  we  are  witnessing  on  our  little  planet, 
wliich  for  ages  had  lived  in  comparative  tranquillity. 
But  has  not  this  formidable  tension  of  the  world-soul 
itself  need  of  limits?  Can  we  conceive  its  being  allowed 
to  increase  indefinitely  until  the  time  when  the  nervous 
system  breaks  down  as  inevitably  it  must?  Can  we 
conceive  our  perpetual  agitation  being  left  without  any 


340  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

limit  save  exhaustion,  insanity,  or  death?  The  question 
answers  itself.  The  limits  to  the  over-excitement  of 
our  nerves  raise  one  of  the  most  serious  problems  of  our 
epoch;  a  problem  with  a  thousand  different  aspects, 
which  involves  morals  as  well  as  hygiene,  politics  as 
well  as  the  intellectual  life.  Now  sport  may  be  one  of 
these  limits,  if  it  be  practised — ^again  I  borrow  from  M. 
de  Coubertin — with  calmness,  "s'il  devient  cet  empire 
du  Matin  Calme  d'ou  les  deux  vampires  de  notre 
civilisation — la  hate  et  la  foule — sont  chasses";  if  it 
be  made,  not  one  more  in  the  long  list  of  causes  of 
excitement  and  exhaustion,  but  a  health-giving  diver- 
sion, a  beneficent  force  capable  of  spraying  the  nerves 
with  that  divine  ambrosia,  now  so  rare  and  so  precious — 
healthy  sleep  and  peace  of  mind.  No  one  who  is 
convinced  of  the  supreme  necessity  for  limits  can  doubt 
that  this  conception  of  sport  is  the  truest,  worthiest, 
and  most  beneficial;  indeed,  the  only  one  that  is  in  its 
turn  susceptible  of  a  limit  and  runs  no  risk  of  losing  it- 
self in  excesses, — those  excesses  of  sport,  in  its  quality 
of  spectacle  for  the  masses,  whose  brutalising  and 
corrupt  effects  are  notorious. 

A  balancing  force,  a  counterpoise  to  the  intellectual 
excesses  of  a  sedentary,  nervous  civilisation  which  is 
agitated  by  a  perpetual  excitement,  that  is  what  sport 
ought  to  be.  I  hasten  to  add  that  I  cannot  claim  the 
credit  for  this  definition,  not  that  it  is  in  itself  a  very 
striking  discovery.  An  opponent  might  even  say  that 
it  is  almost  a  platitude;  a  special  application  of  that 


The  Limit  of  Sport  341 

principle  which  is  as  old  as  the  hills,  and  which  the 
Greeks  expressed  in  their  formula,  [irich  ayav,  no- 
thing in  excess.  Granted;  but  it  is  sometimes  a  good 
thing  to  repeat  platitudes,  for  human  wisdom  is  not 
an  inexhaustible  mine  of  ever-new  principles  and  ideas. 
Its  treasure-house  is  stored  with  platitudes,  which  have 
only  become  such  because  man  is  always  requiring  their 
repetition.  Besides,  when  questions  touching  moral 
and  social  life  are  under  discussion,  the  intellectual 
point  of  view  is  not  by  any  means  the  most  important. 
Those  principles  of  wisdom  which  seem  the  easiest 
and  simplest  to  announce  are  not  those  which  are  always 
the  sim^plest  in  practice,  and  the  easiest  to  carry  into 
execution.  [jlt]S£v  ayav — nothing  in  excess — has  been 
to  men  the  cry  of  wisdom  since  the  beginning  of  time. 
Is  it  not  the  clearest  and  the  simplest  of  principles? 
Need  one  be  a  profound  philosopher  to  understand  that 
moderation  in  the  use  of  everything,  even  of  good  things, 
is  necessary?  This  truth  is  indeed  one  which  the 
simplest  mind  is  capable  of  understanding.  Yet  life 
is  but  an  eternal  struggle  against  excesses  of  all  sorts,  to 
which  man  is  continually  tempted  to  give  way.  Why? 
Because  though  the  precept  be  clear  and  evident,  to 
apply  it  man  has  to  struggle  with  his  passions,  with  his 
own  interests,  and  those  of  others,  and  with  the  illusions 
and  errors  that  assail  him  on  all  sides.  Consequently, 
he  must  be  under  no  illusion. 

You  are  at  one  in  a  conception  of  sport  which  is  the 
noblest  and  wisest  possible,  because  it  regards  sport 


342  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

as  a  balancing  force  between  the  diverse  elements  of 
social  life.  You  band  together  and  join  forces  in  order 
to  popularise  this  conception.  It  is  a  useful  and  a  wise 
task ;  but  it  will  expose  you  to  wearisome  struggles,  and 
you  must  be  prepared  for  many  a  bitter  disappoint- 
ment. In  every  epoch,  those  who  have  wished  to 
introduce  equilibrium  into  life  have  had  to  struggle 
against  this  mysterious  force  which  drives  men  into 
every  excess.  But  in  no  epoch  and  in  no  civilisation 
perhaps  has  this  struggle  been  so  difficult  and  weari- 
some as  it  is  in  contemporary  civilisation.  It  is  a 
phenomenon  which  few  people  nowadays  take  clearly 
and  precisely  into  account;  but  which  is,  nevertheless, 
the  keystone  of  the  greatest  difficulties  by  which  our 
civilisation  is  beset.  Yes,  there  is  no  doubt  about  it,  we 
are  living  at  an  extraordinary  crisis  in  history.  Man 
has  never  been  so  powerful,  so  wise,  so  rich,  so  sure  of 
himself  and  of  his  future.  He  has  dared  to  lift  his  eyes 
and  gaze  steadily  at  the  sombre  mystery  of  things, 
before  which  he  had  for  so  many  centuries  bowed  his 
head  in  trembling.  He  has  conquered  the  world  and 
torn  from  it  its  most  recondite  treasures.  He  has  cast 
aside  all  the  supports  which  sustained  our  ancestors  in 
their  toilsome  march  through  life — traditions,  religions, 
beliefs,  all  the  principles  of  unquestioning  obedience. 
He  had  succeeded  to  a  certain  degree  in  conquering 
space  and  time.  All  the  civilisations  which  preceded  the 
French  Revolution  seem,  if  we  compare  them  with  ours, 
small,   limited,   timid,  poor,   and  inadequate. 


The  Limit  of  Sport  343 

Yet  modem  man  does  not  seem  to  have  any  very 
distinct  and  sure  consciousness  of  his  actual  greatness. 
He  may  be  elated  by  an  occasional  fit  of  glowing  pride, 
but  as  often  as  not  he  is  discontented.  He  grumbles; 
he  sincerely  deplores  the  vices  and  imperfections  of  his 
day.  A  broad  and  deep  current  of  pessimism  flows 
through  the  fabulous  wealth  and  the  wonders  of  our 
times.  Why  ?  Because  our  civilisation  is  by  the  very  na- 
ture of  its  constitution  unable  to  thrive  save  on  excesses ; 
and  it  can  thrive  only  on  excesses  because  it  has  acquired 
so  much  power  by  overturning  nearly  all  the  limits  with- 
in which  previous  civilisations  had  confined  themselves. 

How  marvellous  an  epic,  but  how  disquieting  in  its 
novelty  and  its  grandeur,  is  this  gradual  awakening  of 
human  daring  and  ijride,  of  which  the  history  of  the  last 
four  centuries  is  full!  For  its  first  appearance  dates 
back  to  the  great  geographical  discoveries  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  and  to  that  which  was  the  greatest 
of  all  those  discoveries — America. 

A  few  years  later  saw  the  astronomic  revolution. 
Ancient  thought,  after  long  deliberation,  had  decided  to 
enclose  the  universe  in  a  confined  system,  with  estab- 
lished limits.  Copernicus  took  no  notice  of  these  limits, 
and  launched  out  in  thought  into  the  infinite.  The 
impression  produced  on  the  men  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury by  these  two  great  events  was  profound.  The 
bold  spirits  who  had  dared  to  cross  the  two  limits  con- 
sidered insuperable  on  earth  and  in  the  sky  had  come 
back  with  a  rich  booty  of  land  and  stars. 


344  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

Was  the  world  then  greater  and  man  more  powerful 
than  the  ancients  had  thought,  and  had  the  ancients 
been  wrong  in  seeking  to  limit  the  efforts  of  human 
genius  so  strictly?  Gradually,  during  the  seventeenth 
and  eighteenth  centuries,  the  effort  of  the  human  spirit 
to  free  itself  from  the  ancient  limits  continued,  increased, 
and  became  bolder  and  more  methodical.  Subtle  and 
ingenious  philosophies  delivered  masked  but  clear 
attacks  on  the  limits  which  marked  the  bounds  of 
Good  and  Evil,  Truth  and  Error;  on  tradition,  on 
century-old  invStitutions,  on  authority  in  all  its  forms. 
They  pretended  to  wish  to  ascertain  whether  the  limits 
were  solidly  planted  in  the  right  place;  but  in  reality 
they  undermined  their  foundations.  Little  by  little  an 
idea  crept  into  men's  minds,  an  idea  which  was  the 
negation  of  all  the  limits  within  which  the  world  had 
lived  until  then;  an  idea  which  was  bound  to  upset  the 
conception  of  social  and  moral  life;  the  idea  of  liberty, 
applied  to  religion,  culture,  and  politics.  At  the  same 
time,  by  means  of  science  and  fire,  man  sought  very 
timidly,  if  not  to  free  himself  from,  at  least  to  enlarge, 
the  limits  which  nature  seemed  to  have  set  to  his  forces. 
The  strata  of  coal  began  to  be  discovered  and 
exploited.  Men  set  themselves  to  invent  machines 
more  complicated  and  m.ore  rapid  than  those  of  which 
their  fathers  made  use;  the  steam-engine,  the  foun- 
tainhead  of  all  the  formidable  agitation  which  has 
invaded  the  world,  made  its  appearance;  the  great 
era    of    iron  and   of    fire    began.      And   lo!   finally  a 


The  Limit  of  Sport  345 

formidable  cataclysm,  of  which  man  had  never  seen 
the  like,  in  a  few  years,  upset  traditions,  and  wrought 
havoc  amongst  states,  institutions,  and  old-estab- 
lished laws.  To  the  strains  of  the  Marseillaise,  on 
the  ruins  of  the  Bastile,  on  the  fields  of  Marengo  and 
Austerlitz,  the  work  sketched  out  by  Columbus  and 
Copernicus,  continued  by  Galileo,  Descartes,  Voltaire, 
Rousseau,  and  Kant,  was  completed.  Man  arose, 
tore  up,  and  overturned  all  the  ancient  limits  and 
planted  the  new  ones  with  his  own  hands,  at  his  own 
good  pleasure,  not  only  for  himself  but  also  for  the 
authorities  of  Heaven  and  earth,  who  had  until  then 
imposed  their  limits  upon  him. 

Then  began  the  extraordinary  drama  of  which  we 
are  the  spectators.  Rich,  wise,  and  free,  armed  with 
fire  and  science,  mistress  of  a  large  part  of  the  earth 
and,  in  particular,  of  a  continent  so  vast  and  rich  as 
America,  irked  no  longer  by  any  limit,  not  by  extent 
nor  by  weight  nor  by  matter  and  its  laws  which  it  has 
conquered,  thanks  to  discoveries  and  to  machines,  nor 
by  God,  whom  it  has  banished  to  the  infinite,  itself 
usurping  His  earthly  throne,  our  civilisation  expanded 
in  every  direction,  as  it  were,  carried  away  by  the  in- 
toxication of  the  unlimited.  ]Man  rose  erect  like  a  giant, 
to  face  nature  and  the  past;  and  like  a  giant  whom 
none  can  resist  he  swept  on  and  conquered  the  world. 

Like  a  giant,  indeed,  but  like  a  giant  who  totters  at 
every  step.  This  civihsation  of  ours  has  become  so 
powerful  because  it  has  overturned  all  the  limits;  but 


346  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

just  because  it  has  overturned  nearly  all  the  limits,  it 
has  become  increasingly  difficult  for  it  to  limit  itself 
in  the  good  as  well  as  in  the  bad ;  I  mean  to  say,  that  the 
bad  tends  to  become  worse,  and  the  good  to  become  bad. 
If  the  strength  of  the  forces  of  creation  and  initiative  is 
in  our  epoch  greater  than  ever  it  was  in  any  previous 
epoch,  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  weakness  of  the  forces 
of  equilibrium,  whose  function  it  is  to  check  the  most 
dangerous  exaggerations  and  excesses.  What  an 
interesting  comparison  might  be  made  between  the 
present  and  the  past  from  this  point  of  view;  and  how 
many  instances  could  be  cited  in  proof  of  this  asser- 
tion! I  shall  instance  just  one,  a  simple  and  homely, 
but  clear,  one.  Once  delivered  from  all  the  bonds  which 
limited  his  efforts  of  yore,  man  has  succeeded  in  the 
last  century  in  creating  an  abundance  of  material 
goods  such  as  the  world  had  never  thought  possible 
even  when  it  dreamed  of  the  Terrestrial  Paradise,  the 
Golden  Age,  and  the  Garden  of  the  Hesperides;  all  of 
them  myths  in  which  man  had  been  pleased,  during 
centuries  of  the  life  of  struggle,  to  objectify  his  most 
ardent  desires.  It  is  all  very  well  for  men  of  the  present 
day  to  complain  that  life  is  difficult  and  full  of  struggles. 
Those  who  know  the  difficulties  which  beset  preceding 
centuries  will  feel  a  strong  temptation  to  laugh  at  their 
complaints.  The  modern  world  has  contrived  abun- 
dance in  everything;  in  the  necessities  of  life,  such  as 
bread,  and  in  things  which  become  ver}^  dangerous 
when   they  are  over-abundant,   like   alcoholic   drinks, 


The  Limit  of  Sport  347 

tobacco,  and  all  stimulants.  Many  arc  the  reproaches 
hurled  against  our  epoch  on  the  score  of  the  increase  in 
alcoholism;  many  are  the  remedies  devised  for  this  evil. 
But  would  not  the  only  and  the  simplest  remedy  be 
that  adopted  by  our  ancestors,  the  limitation  of  the 
production  of  liquors?  The  masses  would  no  longer 
be  able  to  poison  themselves  when  the  quantity  of 
these  liquors  was  scarcely  sufficient — as  it  used  to  be 
— for  the  requirements  of  a  moderate  consumption. 
The  world,  on  the  contrary,  will  continue  to  get  glori- 
ously drunk,  so  long  as  the  production  of  wine,  beer, 
and  spirits  increases.  Now  wh}-  is  it  that  this,  the 
only  efficacious  remedy,  is  just  the  one  which  our 
epoch  cannot  bring  itself  to  apply?  Why  do  we  see 
everywhere  governments  taking  measures  of  more  or 
less  efficacy  against  alcoholism  and  at  the  same  time 
contributing,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  the  increase  in 
the  production  of  alcoholic  drinks? 

The  reason  is,  that  nothing  is  more  difficult  for  our 
civilisation  than  to  impose  a  limit  on  anything.  Its 
impetus  carries  it  too  far  in  everything.  It  is  almost 
a  law  of  its  constitution.  We  have,  to  a  great  extent, 
lost  the  sense  of  just  measure,  because  we  have  weak- 
ened or  destroyed  nearly  all  the  authorities  and  moral 
forces  which  used  to  make  the  limits  respected.  Our 
greatness  and  our  power  are  partly  due  to  disequi- 
librium; and  often  enough  we  are  called  on  to  pay  the 
tragic  penalty  for  this  at  the  moment  when  we  least 
expect  the  call. 


34^  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

This  is,  however,  a  long  digression,  and  you  may  with 
reason  ask  me  to  return  to  the  matter  which  interests 
us.  I  have  not  lost  sight  of  it ;  for  this  digression  has  a 
very  close  connection  with  our  subject. 

This  epoch  which  misuses  everything,  misuses  and 
will  misuse  sport.  It  will  make  it — it  has  already 
begun  to  make  it — one  more  of  the  elements  of  excite- 
ment, of  competition,  and  of  exhaustion,  already  alas! 
only  too  numerous.  No  illusions  are  possible  on  this 
score.  It  might  even  be  said  that  sport  is  one  of  the 
things  of  which  our  epoch  will  probably  make  the 
greatest  misuse.  History  justifies  us  in  this  fear,  for 
it  proves  to  us  that  even  those  civilisations,  like  the 
Greek  and  Roman,  which  succeeded  in  limiting  them- 
selves in  everything  else,  misused  games.  Is  it  likely 
that  our  civilisation,  which  misuses  toilsome  activities 
like  work,  will  easily  preserve  a  just  measure  in  amuse- 
ments? Besides,  you  have  only  to  look  round  you  to 
see  interests  forming  groups,  coalitions,  and  organi- 
sations for  the  purpose  of  exploiting,  in  this  field  also, 
the  morbid  need  for  excitement  which  has  taken  hold 
of  the  masses;  their  desire  for  amusements  and  dis- 
tractions and  even  their  incorrigible  weakness  for 
games  of  chance.  Those,  then,  who  wish  to  purge  sport 
of  its  elements  of  haste  and  crowd,  to  transform  it— I 
borrow  once  more  M.  de  Coubertin's  happy  phrase — ■ 
into  the  "Empire  du  Matin  Calme,"  will  have  a 
singularly  difficult  task  before  them.  If,  however,  the 
task  is  difficult,   it  is  for  that  all  the  nobler.     The 


The  Limit  of  Sport  349 

modern  world  has  need,  great  and  urgent  need,  of  bal- 
ance, measure,  and  harmony,  if  it  is  not  to  run  the  risk 
of  being  stifled  by  the  excess  of  its  energy.  Do  not  let 
yourselves  be  deceived  by  its  assurance,  its  pride,  the 
blind  confidence  in  its  powers  which  it  affects,  the 
haughty  challenge  it  so  often  throw^s  to  the  humble 
wisdom  of  past  generations.  We  are  richer,  wiser,  more 
powerful  than  were  our  grandfathers.  But  because  we 
have  discovered  America  and  invented  railways  we 
have  not  become  demi-gods;  we  are  still  only  men. 
All  the  weaknesses  of  human  nature  which  the  moralists 
of  olden  times  discovered  and  analysed  so  subtly  still 
subsist  in  us,  and  still  distract  us ;  we  must  pay  nature, 
the  great  equaliser,  the  price  for  the  advantages  secured 
to  us  by  the  sum  of  the  work  of  preceding  generations; 
and  many  are  the  forms  in  w^hich  that  payment  is  made. 
Nervous  illnesses,  insanit}^  and  suicides  are  on  the 
increase.  Sterility  is  spreading,  especially  in  the 
peoples  and  countries  that  have  been  most  highly 
favoured  by  the  development  of  modern  civilisation. 
A  discontent  as  deep  as  it  is  unreasonable  seems  to 
pervade  the  world,  with  each  improvement  in  the 
conditions  of  every  class.  One  might  say  that  man  has 
become  insatiable.  The  more  blessings  are  heaped 
upon  him,  the  more  he  complains.  The  more  he 
possesses,  the  more  he  thinks  himself  poor  and  needy. 
The  fewer  are  the  causes  for  grief  and  the  dangers 
around  him,  the  more  wretched  he  feels.  These 
apparent  paradoxes,  these  inexplicable  contradictions 


350  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

are  only  the  warnings  life  utters  to  remind  men  of  the 
[jLYjSev  ayav  of  ancient  wisdom.  The  modern  world  suf- 
fers from  the  excesses  to  which  it  abandons  itself, 
even  if  it  will  not  acknowledge  this  fact.  Those  who 
try  to  recall  the  modern  world  to  a  more  harmonious 
ideal  of  life  do  it  a  service  whose  usefulness  is  most 
strikingly  proved  by  the  attitude  of  resentment  it 
assumes  towards  their  efforts. 

Ladies  and  Gentlemen:  I  feel  somewhat  ashamed 
that  my  contribution  to  j'-our  work  must  be  merely 
these  few  general  considerations.  Dissertations  on 
the  ends  to  be  aimed  at  are  easy  enough  to  con- 
coct, but  the  task  is  apt  to  be  a  theoretical  one 
of  little  enough  utility.  The  important  thing  in  all 
the  great  social  problems  is  the  means  of  attaining 
those  ends.  That  is  the  point  upon  which  all  our 
efforts,  all  our  intelligence,  all  our  wills,  must  con- 
verge. I  cannot  be  of  any  use  to  you  in  that,  by 
reason  of  my  incompetence.  I  can  only  attend  this 
congress  as  an  onlooker  anxious  to  learn,  come  not  to 
purvey  information  but  to  convey  it  away.  I  must 
then  confine  myself  at  the  conclusion  of  my  speech  to 
wishing  your  task  and  your  labours  all  the  success 
which  your  energy,  your  enthusiasm,  and  your  faith 
deserve.  But  this  wish  of  mine,  though  sterile  in 
itself,  owing  to  my  inability  to  take  an  active  part  in 
your  work,  is  none  the  less  cordial.  By  birth,  by 
natural  tendencies,  and  by  education,  I  belong  to  a 
culture  which  has  always  tended  to  harmony,  modera- 


The  Limit  of  Sport  351 

tion,  and  equilibrium.  I  have  passed  a  portion  of  my 
life  in  studying  the  ancient  civilisations  which  created 
so  many  beautiful  and  profound  things  because  they 
succeeded  in  limiting  themselves.  I  have  visited  and 
studied  also  those  vast  new  civilisations  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Atlantic,  which  seem  to  be  aiming  at 
the  reaHsation  of  the  perfect  type  of  the  unlimited 
civilisation. 

It  is  not  possible  to  have  been  born  in  Italy,  to  have 
studied  ancient  civilisations,  and  to  have  examined 
at  first  hand  the  tendencies  of  modern  civilisation  in 
Europe  and  America,  without  being  convinced  that  our 
epoch  is  allowing  itself  to  be  seduced  by  too  material 
and  gross  a  conception  of  progress.  Progress  cannot  be 
merely  the  accumulation  of  wealth,  accelerated  by  the 
inventions  and  great  discoveries  of  science,  nor  the 
hurried  transformation  of  everything,  the  perpetual 
change  which  is  the  mania  of  our  epoch.  There  is, 
there  must  be,  another  conception,  more  lofty  than 
this  conception  of  progress;  a  conception  of  progress  as 
the  accumiulated  effort  of  generations.  Is  it  not  true 
that  each  generation  creates  forms  of  beauty,  and 
discovers  new  truths  and  virtues?  Can  we  not  say  that 
generations  really  do  show  progress,  if  they  succeed  in 
preserving  the  creations  of  preceding  epochs,  and  in 
erecting  on  them  as  a  basis  more  complex  and  elevated 
creations  of  their  own? 

Often  and  often,  reflecting  on  the  differences  between 
the  ancient  world  and  our  epoch,  have  I  said  to  myself 


352  Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

that  the  history  of  the  world  would  be  able  to  chronicle 
a  great  step  forv/ard  on  the  day  that  we  succeeded  in 
uniting  in  modern  sport  the  ccsthetic  sense  of  the 
Greeks,  the  modesty  and  decency  for  which  Christ- 
ianity is  responsible,  and  the  democratic,  practical, 
and  active  spirit  of  our  epoch.  Is  that  simply  the 
dream  of  an  ignoramus  who  does  not  know  what  is 
possible  and  what  is  not?  You  may  say  so.  But  if 
your  congress  can  bring  our  civilisation  any  nearer  to 
this  ideal,  it  will  have  done  something  for  real  progress, 
a  work  which  will  merit  the  approbation  of  all  those 
who  wish  to  see  man's  every  effort  concentrated  on  the 
betterment  of  the  spiritual  life.  I  give  you  then,  my 
good  wishes  for  3^our  success  in  your  efforts  in  this 
direction;  and  I  hope  that  you  will  not  take  my  good 
wishes  amiss,  even  though  they  come  from  a  writer 
who  is  not  competent  to  appraise  at  its  true  value  the 
full  worth  of  your  noble  efforts. 


THE  END 


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Authorized  Translation  by  Frances  Lance  Ferrero 

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Student's  Edition.     Cr.  8vo.     $1.50  net 

The  book  consists  of  a  series  of  studies  of  the  great  men  and 
great  ladies  of  ancient  Rome,  and  of  critical  moments  and 
events  in  Roman  history. 

In  the  first,  the  distinguished  author  makes  a  study  of 
"Corruption"  in  Roman  history,  of  the  tendencies  that — and 
here  a  comparison  is  drawn  with  modern  conditions  in  France 
and  America — turned  the  trained  energies  of  Rome,  now  be- 
come rich  and  powerful,  from  the  devotion  to  politics  and  war 
that  made  it  great,  to  luxury,  and  pleasure,  and  extravagance, 
and  a  dilettante  devotion  to  arts  and  letters. 

Certainly  not  the  least  notable  of  the  studies  in  this  volume 
is  that  of  Nero.  It  is  neither  an  attempt  to  rehabilitate  the 
character  of  that  incorrigible  emperor,  nor  is  it  a  lurid  picture 
of  him  as  the  anti-Christ,  but  it  leaves  the  reader  with  an 
understanding  of  the  combination  of  circumstances  which  pro- 
duced the  man,  and  an  explanation  of  the  tendencies  in  Roman 
life  that  would  have  made  it  difficult  even  for  a  strong  and 
determined  ruler  to  hold  his  own. 

Interesting,  entertaining,  picturesque,  full  of  pregnant  ideas, 
this  volume  of  Professor  Perrero's  is  sure  to  find  an  absorbed 
audience  that  will  be  richl)'-  rewarded  for  the  close  attention 
they  will  give  it. 


New  York  Q.  P.  Putnam 's   Sons  London 


Jlpman  History 


The  Greatness  and  Decline  of  Rome 

By  Qugllelmo  Ferrero.  Authorized  Translation  5  Volumes.  Each  $2.50  net 

.Student's  Edition.     Croii'n  Svo.     Each  $1.75  net.     Per  set  $8.00  net 

Vol.    I.     The  Empire  Builders  Vol.111.     The  Pall  ol  an  Aristocracy 

Vol.  II.     Julius  Cffisar  Vol.  IV.     Rome  and  Egypt 

Vol.  V.     To  the  Close  of  the  Reign  of  Augustus,  A.D.  14 

''Plis  largeness  of  vision,  his  sound  scholarship,  his  sense  of  proporti'.n 
hi-  power  to  measure  life  that  has  been  by  his  observation  of  life  that  is — 
Li-^  possession  ul  the  true  historical  sense.  .  .  .  The  translation  i; 
con^pctmi  and  more  than  that,  and  the  histor>'  is  good  reading  through- 
out.     There  are  no  dry  images. "—-.V.  ]',  Times. 

Outlines  of  Roman  History 
By  H.  F.  Pelham,  M.A.,  LL.D.,  University  of  Oxford 

Croii'n  8vo.  Fourth  Edition.  Revised,  linth  maps  and  plans  in  Colors.  Net  $1.75 

"It  is  much  fuller  than  outline  sketches  are  apt  to  be;  the  plan  is  well 
conceived  and  carried  out,  and  the  author  shows  throughout  a  rare  power 
of  grasping  the  most  important  points  and  exhibiting  them  clearly  and 
in  simple  language." — Hie  Xation. 

Rome  of  To-Day  and  Yesterday:  The  Pagan  City 
By  Jolin  Dennie 

6  maps  and  plans,  and  jS  illustrations  f-;}'!:  Ro}>ian  photographs.     8va. 

Tourist's  Pocket  Edition.     Cloth,  flexible,  $2.^0. 
Fiexible  Ica'.lu-r,  $j-^cj 
Tourist's  Edition.     Flexible  leather,  8vo.     Net,  $4.50 

"Rarely  is  sfi  much  excellent  and  instructi\-e  archaeological  matter 
presented  in  a  stylo  so  lucid  and  so  instruct!\'e." — .American  Magazine 
of  History. 

The  Art  of  the  Italian  Renaissance 
By  Heinrich  Wblfflin,  Professor  of  the  University  of  Munich 

A  Handbook  for  the  Use  of  Students,  Travellers,  and  Readers. 
With  over  800  illustratuuis.     Sio.     Net  $2.2^ 

This  bo'ik  is  designed  for  use  as  a  handbook  for  students  and  all  lovers 
of  Renaissance  Art.  It  will  prove  valuable  for  travellers  in  connection 
with  the  masterpieces  which  it  describes;  and  the  profuse  and  beautiful 
illustrations,  with  a  careful  explanation  of  the  text,  will  bring  Italy  to 
those  who  wish  to  enjry  from  their  homes  the  wonders  of  the  Italian 
Renaissance. 

Italian  Life  in  Town  and  Country 
By  Luigi  Villarl 

Xo.  7.     Our  European  Neighbors. 
Crown  8vo.     Fully  Illustrated.     Net  $1.20.    Library  Edition.    Octavo.     With 
colored  jrontispicce  and  48  half-tone  illustrations.     Net  $2.2j 
"Signor  Villari's  bo(jk  is  animated,   \-igorous,  and  informative.     It    is 
written   v^'ith    the   utmost   care   and  with    a    thorough    understanding    of 
I'alv's  x'irlues  and  siiortct^nin-'s."  —  Chuapo  Record-Herald. 


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New  York  G.    P.   Putliam'S  SOHS         London 


Between  the  Old  World 
and  the  New 

A  Moral  and  Philosophical  Contrast 

By 

Guglielmo  Ferrero 

8\    $250 

This  book  combines  the  qualities  of  a  romance, 
a  dialogue,  a  record  of  travel,  and  an  analysis  of 
certain  philosophical  and  sociological  problems. 
The  author  has  undertaken  to  represent  the  conflict 
between  the  two  worlds — not  between  Europe  and 
America  only,  but  between  the  ancient  limited 
civilizations  still  surviving  in  so  many  traditions,  and 
the  aspirations,  the  ambitions,  and  the  passions  of 
this  new  civilization,  which  aim  at  sweeping  away 
all  limits. 

The  title  is  explained  by  the  fact  that  the 
impressions  and  judgments  of  the  old  world  and  the 
new,  and  the  discussions  of  men  and  of  things  with 
which  the  pages  of  the  book  are  filled,  take  form 
upon  the  high  seas  which  divide  the  two  hemispheres. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


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